Teledyne, FLIR merger brings deep space to deep-sea sensing tech under one roof

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  December 3, 2020 | International, Aerospace

  Italy lays out plans to buy up to eight new sensor-loaded Gulfstreams

  By: Tom Kington ROME – Italy is planning to buy up to eight new Gulfstream signals intelligence aircraft and build a maintenance hub for similar aircraft operated by other nations around the Mediterranean. The plans, which were outlined in documents supplied to the Italian parliament, would reinforce Italy's signals intelligence capability as the Mediterranean becomes a flashpoint for regional tensions with neighbors like Turkey and Egypt tussling over the future of lawless Libya. The Italian acquisition was first mentioned in this year's budget document, released in October, which cited the need for ‘multi-mission, multi-sensor' Gulfstream G-550 jets and listed an outlay of 1.23 billion euros. An illustration of the aircraft in the document resembled Israel's ‘Shavit' Signals Intelligence Gulfstream, while the required capabilities listed included command and control, “electronic superiority” and “electronic protection of forces.” Now, the government has sent parliament a second document giving more details of the plan ahead of a vote by the parliamentary defense commission on the purchase. The document calls for the purchase of two aircraft which have already been converted for Sigint missions and equipped with the required systems before the purchase of a further six G-550 jets ready for subsequent conversion. Analysts have suggested the need to buy the unconverted aircraft quickly is due to the Gulftstream G550 going out of production. The aircraft would be based at the Italian Air Force's Pratica di Mare base south of Rome, which is already home to the two Gulfstream 550 Conformal Airborne Early Warning aircraft Italy purchased from Israel's IAI in 2012. With up to 10 G-550s in its fleet, Italy would build up a maintenance operation which would not only serve its own aircraft but be able to “offer services to the Gulfstream fleet operating in Europe and the Middle East, with about 200 jobs created,” the document stated. No indication was given about which company would be contracted to supply the two converted jets or carry out the conversion work on the other six, but the document stated that “given the complexity” of the program, a non-Italian contractor would be brought in. National offset work would be sought the document stated. Funding for the buy is due to kick off next year and will stretch out to 2056 stated the document, which has been seen by Defense News. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2020/12/02/italy-lays-out-plans-to-buy-up-to-eight-new-sensor-loaded-gulfstreams

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  April 14, 2023 | International, Aerospace

  Sweden, Colombia interested in Embraer's KC-390, says Brazilian minister

  Brazilian Defense Minister Jose Mucio said late Thursday that countries such as Sweden and Colombia had expressed interest in buying Embraer's KC-390 military cargo aircraft.

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  May 8, 2020 | International, Naval

  Here’s the DARPA project it says could pull the Navy a decade forward in unmanned technology

  David B. Larter WASHINGTON – A project inside the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has the potential to pull the Navy's unmanned surface vessel aspirations forward a decade, a senior DARPA official said Wednesday at the annual C4ISR Conference. DARPA's effort to develop a ship designed from the keel up to operate without humans, known as “NOMARS” for “no mariners,” is a separate effort from the Navy's quest to develop a family of large and medium unmanned surface vessels. But the benefits of that program, if successful, could be a giant leap forward for the concept the Navy is developing, said Mike Leahy, who heads the Tactical Technology Office at DARPA. The Navy “will only be able to go so far with where the technology has matured,” Leahy said. “What we're able to do is link to that group [developing USVs for the Navy], get information about what missions they are trying to accomplish, the sizing and other constraints, feed that into NOMARS project so that we can take the same class of ship – looking at the same ideas in terms of a hull form – and when we are successful we can dump that right into their tranche and pull that forward a decade from where it might have been on a traditional path.” The Navy and DARPA have been closely linked in efforts to develop unmanned platforms but DARPA's NOMARs will remain an independent effort, Leahy said. The Navy has “been involved in the source selection, they're involved in the testing we're doing, so that we can make sure that information is flowing,” Leahy said. “But we will reserve the right to take risks that may not be in the direction they want to go. Because sometimes learning what does not work is even more valuable than what does. “The physics is going to tell you what you need to know, and you can't cheat it.” Maintaining separate lines of effort is important because DARPA has the freedom to fail whereas failure in an acquisition program has higher stakes, he said. “NOMARS is going and looking at ‘Can I take people completely off ships,'” he explained. “That's a risky endeavor. We don't know if we're going to be able to do that. We don't know if that's going to pan out. You would not want to link an acquisition program directly to that.” Another Option The Navy is currently pursuing both a large and medium unmanned surface vessel that can perform missions for the surface Navy as a means of increasing aggregate naval power without wrapping a $2 billion hull around 96 missile tubes, as Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday has said publicly, referencing the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. Maintaining separate lines of effort is important because DARPA has the freedom to fail whereas failure in an acquisition program has higher stakes, he said. “NOMARS is going and looking at ‘Can I take people completely off ships,'” he explained. “That's a risky endeavor. We don't know if we're going to be able to do that. We don't know if that's going to pan out. You would not want to link an acquisition program directly to that.” Another Option The Navy is currently pursuing both a large and medium unmanned surface vessel that can perform missions for the surface Navy as a means of increasing aggregate naval power without wrapping a $2 billion hull around 96 missile tubes, as Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Michael Gilday has said publicly, referencing the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. https://www.c4isrnet.com/2020/05/06/heres-the-darpa-project-it-says-could-pull-the-navy-a-decade-forward-in-unmanned-technology/