BAE Systems has been contracted by the Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base to develop airborne processing and sensor system hardware and software.
The $11 million contract includes ability to store real time on board detection and tracking of a large number of dismounts and vehicles over a large area.
The contract which was awarded on Thursday will allow the Air Force to detect 20,000 plus infantry soldiers and combat vehicles with the tracking hardware. The next generation wide area motion imaging or WAMI sensor analysis technology will communicate with a ground station and also store the information.
The BAE Systems Electronics contract also requires it to provide data storage facilities, chipping, dissemination and processing control. It will also develop ground processing software to help Intelligence and Support engineers to analyze and download video related WAMI data.
The WAMI technology sensors need platforms with long endurance to gather and analyze data over large periods of time. The Boeing A160T Hummingbird unmanned helicopter may be used to handle the sensors that gather this WAMI data.
The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency oversees most advanced WAMI technology research for the military as part of DARPA's program. This includes the Persistent Stare Exploitation and Analysis System program.