BAE Systems Awarded $34M Radio Frequency Contract to Enhance Helicopter Survivability

BAE Systems has been awarded a $34 million Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) contract to develop the next generation Multi-Function Radio Frequency (MFRF) Advanced Rotary Wing Multifunction Sensor (ARMS) system for helicopter operations. The MFRF ARMS system improves aircraft survivability in degraded visual environments (DVE) while enhancing platform lethality and minimizing size, weight, power and cost. “The ARMS system helps solve the number one cause of helicopter-related casualties and breaks new ground in silicon-based phased array technology,” said Dave Logan, vice president and general manager of BAE Systems Technology Solutions. The system will be designed to allow for safe take-off and landing in brownout or whiteout conditions. Other advantages of the MFRF system include cable and obstacle avoidance, collision avoidance, terrain following/terrain avoidance, weather avoidance, landing zone assessment and ground mapping. The system’s multi-functionality also enables additional modes for lethality enhancements including targeting, weapons guidance and high bandwidth data communications. A key component of the system is a highly-modular and scalable W-band Active Electronically Steered Array (AESA) constructed using only silicon semiconductors. The AESA design, which includes over 10,000 elements, is built from a silicon Transmit/Receive “Tile” containing 16 elements and beamformer electronics in a single chip. The result is a software-programmable, AESA-based radar/sensor that can be scaled up or down across a wide range of aperture sizes. A Software Developers Kit will be designed that allows system developers to rapidly define and program new radar modes into the sensor.