BAE Systems’ research and development arm has received a contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency as part of its Massive Cross Correlation program.
Under the $14 million contract, BAE Systems’ FAST Labs segment will develop technology designed to support the use of modern signal processing and computation on a novel variety of compact military platforms, BAE announced from Merrimack, New Hampshire on Wednesday.
“Smaller and more efficient systems improve size, weight, power, and costs to allow for full-spectrum signal processing closer to the edge, or onto platforms operating in denied airspace,” said Bryan Choi, who serves as technology development director for FAST Labs.
He added that the new analog correlator technology can improve decision making, equip small platforms to deploy mission-critical technology and help build a new type of system.
Signal processing enables Department of Defense activities surrounding sensing, imaging and communications systems, and correlators play a major role in comparing, contrasting and processing signals. Today, many digital correlator technologies are cumbersome and require large amounts of power.
BAE Systems’ role in the program will be to create a more efficient analog correlator with high dynamic range and wide bandwidth to support new capabilities, such as synthetic aperture radar image classification and image formation, automatic target recognition, passive coherent location and jam-resistant communications in small form factor platforms.
In carrying out this work, BAE Systems will team with the University of Minnesota, a subcontractor on the program.
This award follows multiple DARPA contract wins for BAE Systems. In May, the company’s FAST Labs sector received a $7 million award to develop an autonomous space-based surveillance tool under the agency’s Oversight program, and in March, FAST Labs booked a $5 million contract to continue its work on the Technologies for Mixed-mode Ultra Scaled Integrated Circuits initiative.