
July 2023

The McHale Report, by militaryembedded.com Editorial Director John McHale, covers technology and procurement trends in the defense and aerospace electronics community.
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PODCAST

MOSA, AI, and unsafe programming languages

Modular open system approach (MOSA) strategies such as the Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE) Technical Standard are changing how the Department of Defense acquires technology. In this podcast with Tim Reed, Chief Executive Officer for Lynx Software Technologies, he and I discuss how MOSA benefits the warfighter and what it means to be certified conformant other the FACE Technical Standard.

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TOP STORY

U.S. soldiers train in counter-UAS operations in Kuwait

U.S. Army Central (USARCENT) launched the "Green Sands" training session July 13-24 in Kuwait to allow U.S. soldiers to train in counter-UAS (C-UAS) operations, according to the agency's announcement.

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TOP STORY

Autonomous aircraft certification plan formally accepted by the FAA

Aircraft automation company Reliable Robotics reports that its safety-enhancing aircraft automation certification plan has been formally accepted by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), a milestone the company says is the farthest a company has progressed toward certification of fully automated aircraft.

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SPECIAL REPORT

Industry pushing for AI, big data to drive strategic defense decision-making

As the defense industry grapples with exponential increases in mission data that must be collected, managed, and analyzed, the promise of artificial intelligence (AI) to harness the power of big data and drive strategic decision-making represents an unprecedented shift in the industry.

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TOP STORY

Spirit Electronics acquires Insight Analytical Labs, gains device analysis capability

Spirit Electronics announced its acquisition of Insight Analytical Labs (Colorado Springs, Colorado); Insight Analytical Labs' team, operations, and assets will become part of Spirit Electronics.

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GUEST BLOG

GaAs and GaN MMICs: Key component of defense RF electronic systems

Monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs) fabricated using compound semiconductors are a critical component of a multitude of RF [radio-frequency] systems. For commercial wireless applications, gallium arsenide (GaAs)-based power amplifiers are ubiquitous in the smartphone market, while gallium nitride (GaN) products service wireless base stations, SATCOM terminals, and are a core enabler of 5G systems.

Electronic warfare, radar and SIGINT applications demand direct RF solutions to deliver low-latency, real-time signal processing solutions for critical real-time decision-making. The DRF3182 3U OpenVPX direct RF FPGA board offers fast wideband data capture up to Ku band at the edge with heterogeneous FPGA processing.

MIL TECH TRENDS

Multi-agent augmentive artiﬁcial intelligence: an exoskeleton for warrior minds

A story that went viral on social media early in 2023 reportedly claimed that during a U.S. military artiﬁcial intelligence (AI) drone simulation, the AI targeted and killed the human drone operator. It had apparently determined the human had been interfering with its mission: in this case, to take out surface-to-air missile (SAM) threats.

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TOP STORY

Boeing and Intel to collaborate, focus on advancing semiconductor technology for aerospace

Boeing and Intel announced a new strategic collaboration under which the companies are working together to advance semiconductor technology across the aerospace industry, with the intent to create next-generation microelectronics applications in artificial intelligence (AI), secure computing, and advanced flight capabilities for future products.

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TOP STORY

ML-based control architecture for uncrewed surface vessels in development for DARPA

Boeing subsidiary Aurora Flight Sciences is working on the development and testing of machine learning-based introspection technologies to help uncrewed surface vessels (USV) better operate in a maritime environment, the company announced in a statement.

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MARKET RESEARCH

Unmanned maritime vehicle market to surpass $3.1 billion by 2033, study says

The size of the unmanned maritime vehicle (UMV) market is forecast to reach over $3.1 billion by 2033, a projected increase of over $1.9 billion from the size of the 2023 market, driven by a growing number of applications for littoral warfare, according to a report from GlobalData, "Unmanned Maritime Vehicles – Thematic Intelligence."

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GUEST BLOG

From Evangelism to Mandate: The Rise of MOSA

For many COTS vendors and VITA members, the Tri-Services Memo issued in January 2019 by the secretaries of the Army, Navy and Air Force was the highest validation of several decades of their combined efforts.

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TOP STORY

Nano-drones to be provided to U.S. Army by Teledyne

Teledyne FLIR Defense has won a five-year contract to provide the U.S. Army with Black Hornet 3 Personal Reconnaissance Systems (PRS), the company announced in a statement.

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TOP STORY

Rad-hard project from DARPA aims to speed deployment of reliable space electronics

A new project from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is attempting to help government and industry more quickly and reliably harden space-based microelectronics against damage caused by single-event effects, such as solar flares.

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TOP STORY

Military comms satellite launched to aid French forces

The SYRACUSE 4B military communications satellite, the latest addition to the SYRACUSE IV defense communications system, was successfully launched from the Guiana Space Center by an Ariane 5, according to a statement from manufacturer Thales.

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