11 novembre 2022 | International, C4ISR
The human touch: âArtificial General Intelligenceâ is next phase of AI
AGI is the ability of an intelligent agent to understand or learn any intellectual task in the same way that humans do.
17 décembre 2018 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
Modernization top priority in FY20 budget, Pentagon’s No. 2 official says
By: Valerie Insinna
WASHINGTON — As the Trump administration and Congress deliberate the Defense Department's top-line budget for fiscal 2020, safeguarding the military's weapons programs and funding technology development is taking precedence over growing the force, the Pentagon's No. 2 official said Thursday.
“At the end of the day, the national defense strategy puts a priority on modernization,” Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan told reporters Dec. 13. “The trick then becomes, when you talk about force structure, how much risk do you take given the world's environment?”
Shanahan's comments come at a time of back-and-forth between President Donald Trump, Defense Department leadership and Congress about the size of the FY20 defense budget.
Pentagon budget makers had been planning for a $733 billion budget request — a modest increase over the $716 billion budget for FY19 — when Trump announced in October that the Defense Department's budget would instead be cut to $700 billion. The move surprised many, as Trump had frequently touted his administration's efforts to grow the size of the military and invest in new defense technology.
The announcement raised questions about what the Pentagon would have to cut in order to meet the lower number, but it appears that those concerns may have been premature. Earlier this week, Politico and other outlets reported that congressional Republicans and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis had convinced Trump to raise the top line to $750 billion.
Shanahan on Thursday downplayed the reports, saying that a final top line had yet to be determined.
"We're looking at numbers above $733 [billion], and as you know, we looked at numbers below $733 [billion]. I think everybody recognizes that this is a discussion that will go on in terms of what is the right number. The process we have is very robust,” he said.
No matter what the top line ends up looking like, the goal will be “anchor[ing] line items to the National Defense Strategy. That's the rigor we put in place,” he added.
With a top line above $733 billion, it's possible the Defense Department will be able to grow both its modernization accounts as well as funding for improving readiness and increasing force structure.
But Shanahan, who spoke at a National Defense Industrial Association event on hypersonics on Thursday, tried to quell defense contractors' concerns that funding for hypersonic technologies, and science and technology development in general, could suffer under a budget that rings in at $733 billion or below.
Asked by one Lockheed Martin employee whether funding for hypersonics programs would remain reliable in light of budgetary fluctuations, Shanahan said his level of confidence was high it would.
“We've prioritized amortization,” he said.
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18 décembre 2020 | International, Aérospatial
Counter-drone startup Epirus raises $70M, plans to hire 100 people
By: Joe Gould WASHINGTON ― Epirus, a venture-backed startup offering a counter-drone capability, announced Thursday it raised $70 million to speed its technology to market. The round was led by San Francisco, California-based Bedrock Capital, and brings the 2-year-old company's total capital raised to roughly $80 million. The news comes six months after Epirus inked a strategic supplier agreement with Northrop Grumman to provide exclusive access to Epirus' software-defined electromagnetic pulse system Leonidas. Since then, the firm has doubled in size and plans to add 100 jobs in 2021. “We're aggressively hiring and expanding our footprint on the East and West coasts,” Epirus CEO Leigh Madden told Defense News. He added that the firm is shifting its headquarters from the Hawthorne, California, office to its newer offices in Tysons Corner, Virginia. Alongside Bedrock and several other investment firms, L3Harris Technologies is investing in Epirus. Epirus developed a SmartPower power-management technology that underpins its counter-unmanned aircraft system, and the company plans to partner with L3Harris to create greater power efficiencies within some of its existing systems. The technology, which allows the system to deliver a high-power output with a relatively low-power input, has a range of applications across other radio frequency systems, Madden said. (The company's systems involve a combination of high-power microwave technology and, for enhanced targeting, artificial intelligence.) The new funding, “enables us to rapidly build out our counter-UAS system,” Madden said. “We'll be bringing the Leonidas system to market as well as advancing the capabilities of our SmartPower technology ― and working with government customers and partners to expand the application of that technology.” Beyond Bedrock and L3Harris, the new Series B funding came from Piedmont Capital Investments, 8VC, Fathom VC and Greenspring Associates. In 2019, Epirus closed $17 million in Series A funding, which was led by 8VC. (Series A is meant to help a company progress to the development stage, and Series B is meant to help a company market or expand its existing market footprint.) Geoff Lewis of Bedrock Capital said in a statement that investors are “confident Epirus has the capacity to integrate its technology into top tier counter-UAS systems and lead the way in developing new and compelling directed energy applications.” “Epirus counters the weak assumption baked into standard VC models that the economic and cultural gaps of defense-focused investments are too wide to overcome,” Lewis said. https://www.defensenews.com/2020/12/17/counter-drone-startup-epirus-raises-70m-plans-to-hire-100-people/
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3 mars 2021 | International, Aérospatial, C4ISR
Turkey’s Baykar begins designing AI-powered combat drone
The artificial intelligence-powered aircraft will be able to perform missions for five hours, and will be connected to a satellite communications data network.