helping you keep an eye on things...
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Business development |
One of the aims of the MoD Grand Challenge that we are involved in is to contribute to the building of an industrial infrastructure in the UK that can support the ongoing development and deployment of systems that the MoD can use in the detection of threats to military personnel.
To that end, Lord Drayson urged the participants to immediately start building business relationships and to begin a dialogue with potential sources of funding to enable the participants to build on their involvement in the MoD Grand Challenge.
In addition to the defence side of our activities, we are building on our oil, gas and mineral exploration activities.
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Meeting in Rome of EuroCAE Working Group 73 on Unmanned Aircraft Systems |
Meeting of the EuroCAE Working Group 73 Small Unmanned Aircraft Subgroup members at the Avionica Galileo facility just outside Rome from Monday 29th October to Tuesday 30th October. The Plenary meeting took place on Wednesday 31st October. This Subgroup is developing recommendations for harmonised (initially within Europe, later on, global) definitions, air worthiness standards, operations procedures and command and control protocols for small Unmanned Aircraft Systems. Present were, standing, from left to right: Michel Roelandt (EUROCONTROL), Graham Lynn (Europe Air Sports), Michael Poole (UK CAA), Christer Wikstrom (Swedish CAA), Peter van Blyenburgh (UVS International), Ulf Johansson (Swedish CAA), Gerhard Lippitsch (AUSTRO CONTROL), Bernhard von Bottmer (UAV DACH), and seated, from left to right were: Joseph Barnard (Barnard Microsystems Limited), Doug Davis (USA FAA), Richard Hermans (CAA Netherlands) and Andrej Koukol (Honeywell, Czech Republic). The definition of a "small" Unmanned Aircraft is one with a take-off weight of less than 150 kg.
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Third meeting at MBDA, second time in Stevenage |
Photograph kindly supplied by Mohan Ahad of MBDA (front row, fourth from left, holding folder).
On 23rd October, some members of four Teams (for some reason Raglan Tribe appears not to be in this photograph) participating in the MoD Grand Challenge met at the MBDA Stevenage Site to work on the definition of the interfaces to the MBDA NEMESIS software, and on the definition of the flight plan syntax. The development of the NEMESIS software is progressing to schedule.
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Meeting Dr Rashid Ali at the University of Hertfordshire |
On Monday 22nd October I visited Dr Rashid Ali, Senior Lecturer in the School of Aerospace, Automotive and Design Engineering at the University of Hertfordshire, to discuss the design of Flight Control Units and see the impressive facilities at the University. Rashid and his students have the ability to design both the Unmanned Aircraft airframe and the guidance and control electronics, and can make the airframe on site.
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Meeting with James Habershon and James Hickey of MBDA |
Joe Barnard (centre) of BML meets James Hickey (left) and James Habershon (right) at the very impressive MBDA facilities in Stevenage on Tuesday 2nd October, 2007, to discuss the user requirements and interface details in respect of the MBDA NEMESIS software. The NEMESIS software will be used by several MoD Grand Challenge Teams, including the Barnard Microsystems Team, in conjunction with staff from MBDA, to plan missions and analyse visual, infra-red and thermal imagery from the missions.
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Meeting with members of Middlesex University I-SPY Team |
On Thursday 27th September, members of the Middlesex University I-SPY Team and Joe Barnard, leader of the Barnard Microsystems Team, met at Middlesex University Trent Campus to discuss aspects of multi-rotor hover vehicle technology. In the above photograph, courtesy of Mehmet Erbil, are from left to right: Mehmet Erbil (I-Spy), Tom Foran (I-Spy), Sid Odedra (I-Spy), Dr Joe Barnard (BM) and Dr Stephen Prior (I-Spy). The quadrotor shown above was simply used to illustrate some points in the discussion, and does not represent the actual technology either Team is pursuing.
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Article in the local Ham and High Broadway newspaper |
A few points...
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There is a slight mix-up of the environment for some oil and gas exploration activities, where there is a need for low level flying over the arctic regions to measure the earth's magnetic field, and the military environment.
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The bit about "enabling soldiers to attack from afar" is attributable to the editor's vivid imagination.
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I think the bit about each Team "must overcome a series of obstacles including explosives and hidden snipers" may convey an impression of the event that is at variance with reality. The aim is simply to identify the location of several types of potential threats to military personnel.
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Meeting with staff from MBDA |
On the 5th of September, several Teams participating in the MoD Grand Challenge, including the Barnard Microsystems Team, were invited by Mohan Ahad of MBDA to visit the impressive MBDA site at Filton, Bristol, to discuss ways in which MBDA and the Teams could work together to use the NEMESIS software developed at MBDA.
"MBDA and Barnard Microsystems have agreed in principle to collaborate on participating in the MoD Grand Challenge, where MBDA has offered to develop NEMESIS (Network Enabled Multi-Environment System Integration Solution) which is essentially an information handling system to support a semi-autonomous vehicle in an urban environment. The intention is to build the architecture based on software modules and middleware provided by MBDA, which would then allow Barnard to add and test their own algorithms, vehicles and sensors. NEMESIS should permit these components to operate as a system..."
- from the introduction to the Non Disclosure Agreement signed between MBDA and Barnard Microsystems Limited
MBDA: A WORLD LEADING MISSILE SYSTEMS COMPANY
With an annual turnover of over €3 billion, an order book of over €13 billion and more than 70 customers around the world, MBDA is a world leading guided missiles and missile systems company.
MBDA was created in 2001 following the merger of Europe’s major businesses in the sector: Matra BAe Dynamics in the UK and France, Aerospatiale Missiles in France, the missiles activities of Alenia Marconi Systems in the UK and Italy and EADS/LFK in Germany. MBDA is jointly owned by BAE Systems (37.5%), EADS (37.5%) and Finmeccanica (25%).MBDA currently has 45 missile system and countermeasure programmes in operational service around the world and has proven its ability as prime contractor to head major multi-national projects.
- from http://www.mbda.co.uk/
The MBDA Filton centre is on the same site as other BAE Systems buildings, including the BAE Systems Sowerby Research Centre, reflecting their common heritage.
- from Google Earth
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Meeting with some members of the Dragon Air Systems Team |
Dr Joe Barnard of the Barnard Microsystems Team with Jon Exton and Roy King, both of the Dragon Air Systems Team, at a meeting on Friday 24th August at the BML Lab in North London, discussing areas of mutual interest, especially the potential use of the Dragonfly Air Systems platform.
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Lt Col Philip Poole, Defence Academy of the United Kingdom |
Lt Col Philip Poole of the Defence Academy of the UK discusses with Dr Joseph Barnard of Barnard Microsystems the nature of the contributions BML could make to the UK Defence Capability Centre by way of communicating the capabilities of emerging technologies, such as those that will be used in the MoD Grand Challenge:
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material for a poster board, where the boards are 1.8 m wide and 1.5 m tall
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presentation material for use in lectures, in Power Point format
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hardware demonstrators
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video footage of system demonstrators, emphasising system capabilities from a defence perspective
At the meeting on Monday, 20th August, 2007, Dr Barnard offered to supply the Defence Capability Centre with contributions in all of the above categories, with particular emphasis on the technology to be used in the MoD Grand Challenge, including versions of the Unmanned Aircraft to be used by the BM Team in the MoD Grand Challenge.
There is tremendous opportunity to display new defence capabilities arising from emerging technologies. This part of the Defence Capability Centre supports multiple, large, video displays and static demonstrators where the DCC staff and any invited personnel can make presentations to a select and influential audience.
Hardware demonstrators of emerging technologies are very much welcomed. One possibility is to hang some Unmanned Aircraft from the ceiling.
An example of a poster board that is used to present the capabilities of emerging technologies. Other participants in the MoD Grand Challenge who wish to contribute material that might be used at the Defence Capability Centre are encouraged to contact Lt Col Poole at ppoole.dcm@da.mod.uk.
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Roger Archer, MD of Alliance |
Roger Xuereb Archer, Managing Director of Alliance based in Malta discusses the development of a business relationship with Dr Joseph Barnard, Managing Director of Barnard Microsystems based in the U.K. at a meeting in London on Monday, 6th August 2007. Malta is well placed as a centre of oil and gas exploration activities in North Africa, and especially in the untapped regions of Libya.
Map courtesy Google Earth.
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Barnard Microsystems |
Alliance |
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(C) Barnard Microsystems Limited 2006 - 2007