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Meggitt Training Systems changes name to InVeris Training Solutions
WASHINGTON ― The live-fire and virtual weapons training company Meggitt Training Systems is rebranding to InVeris Training Solutions, the company announced Wednesday.
The Suwanee, Ga., firm, is shedding the name of its former parent company, Meggitt Plc., which sold the former subsidiary to private investment firm Pine Island Capital Partners LLC for $146 million in July. The new name is meant to connote trust and integrity, the company said.
Pine Island's partners include former former U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen, former Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, former House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt and former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michele Flournoy.
Partner Clyde Tuggle, a former Coca-Cola executive, serves as interim CEO for InVeris, and Chambliss ― a partner at Pine Island ― is non-executive chairman for InVeris.
Chambliss, now with Washington law firm DLA Piper, represented Georgia as a Republican and served on the armed services and intelligence committees before retiring from Congress nearly six years ago. He became aware of the company now known as InVeris while serving in Congress and said it was a natural fit for Pine Island because of his partners' backgrounds in the defense space.
“We clearly understood at the time of the purchase back on July 1 that we were buying a company that is the gold standard when it comes to providing training for the United States military as well as to international clients in the same arena,” Chambliss said.
“Going forward, we think that clearly we have the opportunity, number one, to provide the resources to what is now known as InVeris to expand from a technology standpoint the products that we have been making for years, and to further develop and bring those products into the 21st Century.”
The company, which employs roughly 450 people, will retain its ownership of its legacy brands, FATS (a line of virtual systems) and Caswell technologies.
The company continues to work on the U.S. Army's Engagement Skills Trainer II contract and Squad Advanced Marksmanship-Trainer program, as well as the U.S. Marine Corps' Indoor Simulated Marksmanship Trainer, according to Vice President of Strategy, Sales and Marketing Andrea Czop. It's also fielded derivatives of those systems to the Navy and Air Force.
The company has fielded over 15,000 live-fire ranges and 5,100 virtual training systems globally in its 90-year history. It also has clients in more than 55 countries―including programs of record in Canada, Australia and the U.K. for more than 25 years.
Foreign sales are key to its growth plans, company executives say.
“We continue to be very active with all those international customers, and we're growing,” said Czop. “There are a lot of opportunities for us right now, and the focus is our international strategy.”
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The US Air Force wants to buy a big robot to help with bomb disposal
By: Valerie Insinna and Jen Judson UPDATE — This story has been updated to add comment from L3Harris on its participation in the competition. WASHINGTON — A year after the U.S. Army awarded a contract to build a heavy-duty robot able to dispose of bombs and other explosives, the Air Force is looking for its own system — and it wants to see what's on the market before committing to purchasing what the Army buys. The Air Force in October released a solicitation for a large explosive ordnance disposal robot, a commercial off-the-shelf system equipped with a maneuverable arm and a camera system that can function in all terrain types, environments and weather conditions. An Air Force spokesman declined to confirm how many companies submitted bids for the program, which were due Nov. 20. One competitor has already come forward: FLIR, which is set to rake in as much as $109 million building its Kobra robot for the Army's Common Robotic System-Heavy program. The company began full-rate production of Kobra last month and is confident the Air Force will follow the Army's example by choosing the same system. “As the chosen provider for the Army's Common Robotic System-Heavy (CRS-H) program, FLIR believes its extensively tested and proven unmanned ground system meets the Air Force needs in the large EOD robot category, while enabling commonality of equipment with other services' EOD forces,” said Tom Frost, who runs FLIR's unmanned ground systems business. QinetiQ, which lost out to FLIR in the CRS-H competition, did not respond to a query about whether it had bid on the Air Force program. An L3Harris spokesperson confirmed to Defense News that it had submitted its T7 EOD robot to the Air Force competition. L3Harris said it wanted to be chosen for the CRS-H program in 2018. The company unveiled the robot at the Association of the US Army's annual conference in 2016 letting show attendees take a crack at operating the arm on the robot. The controller looks like the back end of a gun making it easy to hold, and is hooked to sensors that transfer information to the robotic arm on the T7. The United Kingdom is a customer of the T7 for EOD missions. At times, the Air Force has joined Army robot programs without needing to hold a competition. But in the case of larger EOD robots, the two services have differing requirements that have led the Air Force to seek out its own system instead of jumping into the CRS-H program, said S. Chase Cooper, a contracting officer who is managing the EOD robot solicitation on behalf of the Air Force's 772nd Enterprise Sourcing Squadron “The major difference is that the Army's mission is primarily to operate ‘outside the wire' ” — that is, outside of a secure military installation — “where the Air Force's mission is primarily ‘inside the wire.' These are two entirely different environments,” he said in a statement to Defense News. Cooper also pointed to additional considerations such as the size and weight of the system. Most Air Force EOD missions occur after bombs or other improvised explosive devices are found at a base or installation. When that happens, teams load robots and other gear into a Base Response Vehicle or Bomb Squad Emergency Response Vehicle, drive out to the location of the explosive device, and safely dispose of the explosive. Whatever robot the Air Force chooses must be small enough to fit inside those vehicles, Cooper said. That includes passing through a 32-inch-wide door opening and parking into a space 91 inches long and 63 inches high. The Air Force's requirement for weight, which is set at a maximum of 1,000 pounds, is less stringent than the Army's 700-pound limit. The Air Force also called for a system with a minimum 800-meter, line-of-sight radio range, and a 3-hour runtime that will allow it complete the majority of EOD missions. Cooper noted that the Air Force's decision to pursue an open competition does not preclude the FLIR robot from being chosen by the service. “It is unknown at this time if that system would meet our requirements,” Cooper said. “Through our contracting process, we are evaluating all of the proposed large robot systems against the Air Force's requirement so we can make sure the system we purchase is the best one for our airmen.” The Air Force has a history of both collaborating with the Army on EOD robots and going its own way. For its medium-sized unmanned ground vehicle, the Air Force opted to use the Army's existing contract under the Man Transportable Robotic System Increment II program for FLIR's Centaur UGV, which is also being purchased by the Navy and Marine Corps. But while QinetiQ beat out FLIR in the Army's competition for CRS-Individual — a man-packable robot that is less than 25 pounds — the Air Force ended up pursuing a separate contract to meet its own unique needs for small unmanned ground vehicles. https://www.defensenews.com/air/2020/12/03/the-air-force-wants-to-buy-a-big-robot-to-help-with-bomb-disposal/