NEW TECHNOLOGIES
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www.oxleygroup.com
17 Oct 06. The Boeing [Family of Advanced Beyond-line-of-sight Terminals (FAB-T) program has successfully completed a Preliminary Design Review, a key milestone as the program moves forward. Attended by more than 150 Boeing, senior government and industry officials, the review, held in Anaheim, Calif., in September, demonstrated that Boeing and its industry team have successfully incorporated schedule and requirement changes that are part of the program’s new baseline. The four-day review included presentations from systems, software and hardware teams.
17 Oct 06. New ‘grenade machine gun’ goes on display. The Ministry of Defence will be demonstrating a range of its latest land attack weapons during a live-firing demonstration on Salisbury Plain this week – including the first public showing of a potent new ‘grenade machine gun’ destined for British troops in Afghanistan. The potent new weapon system, known as the Automatic Lightweight
Grenade Launcher (ALGL), can fire up to 340 High Explosive grenades a
minute and will be mounted on the back of a modified Land Rover to
provide increased mobile firepower at ranges of up to 2km.
10 Oct 06. New technology to protect helicopters. NATO countries moved a step closer to providing their helicopters with added protection from rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) with the successful demonstration of prototype technology in Bulgaria. Results of the demonstration, held on 10 October, indicate about 80% probability of protection. The technology, described as “passive”, is designed to be strapped onto helicopters. It prevents rocket-propelled grenades from exploding, thereby improving levels of safety for passengers, crews, and aircraft, from ground-based RPG attacks. The development of the technology was a collaborative effort undertaken over two years between the Bulgarian Ministry of Defence and the Bulgarian Academy of Science. It is part of NATO’s Defence Against Terrorism programme, under which NATO countries lead programmes to develop cutting-edge technologies that address today’s most pressing terrorism-related security needs.
16 Oct 06. Harris Corporation is the first company to successfully uplink to a Milstar satellite using an Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) Navy Multiband Terminal prototype system. This milestone follows the company’s announcement last month that it was the first to acquire and track low- and medium-data-rate waveforms on Milstar 6 using the same prototype terminal. An SCA 2.2.1-compliant software programmable modem developed by Harris was instrumental in both successful demonstrations. Once fielded, the terminal will serve as the common element of naval information networks, providing interconnection of individual naval assets with other services and, eventually, with the Global Information Grid.
18 Oct 06. Lockheed Martin’s Missiles and Fire Control business unit achieved the highest possible rating for maturity of its engineering and management processes. The company’s Maturity Level 5 rating was established during its recent Capability Maturity Model® Integration (CMMI) appraisal. Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control demonstrated Maturity Level 5 compliance across its entire enterprise for the full CMMI model, the CMMI for Systems Engineering, Software Engineering, Integrated Product and Process Development and Supplier Sourcing (CMMI-SE/SW/IPPD/SS) Version 1.1.
16 Oct 06. DSM, a Netherlands-based company active worldwide in performance
materials, is introducing its newest and strongest ballistic material for soft body armor. The new Dyneema® SB61 offers ultra-high energy absorption to provide significantly increased stopping power, as well as the same high level of trauma reduction and aging behavior as other Dyneema® soft ballistic products. Dyneema® SB61 has been chosen by American Body Armor, a leading manufacturer of branded products