PATUXENT RIVER NAS Md., 15 April 2014. Four U.S. designers of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are set to square-off in a do-or-die competition to build the first deployable carrier-based combat UAV. U.S. Navy officials have signaled the imminent release of a soliciation to design the Unmanned Carrier Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) aircraft.

GREENBELT, Md., 13 April 2014. Laser communications (lasercom) experts at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., needed a space-qualified digital processor to support an optical communications relay between Earth and geosynchronous orbit over an extended period. They found their solution from SEAKR Engineering Inc. in Centennial, Colo.

Electro-optics experts at Raytheon Co. Space and Airborne Systems in McKinney, Texas, won two contracts worth $22.9 million total to provide multispectral sensors for U.S. military aircraft.

U.S. Army missile-defense experts are asking industry to supply an adjustable-power 50-kilowatt laser that with its cooling subsystem can fit on an 8-by-53-foot full-sized flatbed trailer.

ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md., 11 April 2014. U.S. Army aviation experts needed special processors to convert electronic signals from helicopter sensors to trend information for display on night-vision equipment. They found their solution from Elbit Systems of America LLC in Fort Worth, Texas.

Leaders of the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) propose spending $10.67 billion in federal fiscal year 2015 for procurement and research in military communications, electronics, telecommunications, and intelligence (CET&I) technologies.