Indra has developed a 360 vision system based on Artificial Intelligence that endows armoured vehicles with situational awareness.
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Press Release, Madrid, 20 May 2024: Indra has developed a 360 vision system based on artificial intelligence that endows armoured vehicles with situational awareness and increases their effectiveness when it comes to fulfilling their mission.
The company presented the system to the [Spanish] Ministry of Defence, an evolution of the solution it began to develop during the initial phase of the 8×8 Dragon program, during a demonstration held at Wheeled Vehicle Maintenance Park and Center No. 2 in Córdoba before the heads of the Army General Staff (EME), the General Directorate of Armament and Material (DGAM) and the Army’s Logistic Support Command (MALE).
The system incorporates different artificial intelligence algorithms that analyse the images collected by the visible, night-vision and infrared cameras placed on different parts of the vehicle. It increases the range of potential identification of people and platforms thanks to AI, determines whether they are friends or foes and evaluates the degree of threat and the possibility of ambushes, proposing potential protective measures and lines of action to fulfil the mission.
The crew members monitor all the information and jointly contribute to its analysis in order to streamline the perception and understanding of what is going on at any given time, further increasing the efficiency of the system.
According to Miguel Rodríguez Mora, Indra’s sales director, “this is a technology that the most advanced armies in the world, including those of the US, the United Kingdom and Germany, are opting for,” while he stressed that “the use of AI will be particularly important during operations in complex environments such as urban and low-visibility areas, where it’s more difficult to distinguish attackers and the reaction times are shorter.”
Rodríguez Mora added that what sets Indra’s 360 vision system apart is that “it goes beyond mere perception of the environment and has the ability to understand data, recognise patterns and interpret and evaluate what’s happening and how it’s affecting the plans that have been put in place.” In this regard, he underlined, it can “automate tasks and make decisions much more seamlessly and clearly in situations of maximum stress, reducing the number of errors and increasing safety.”
The 360 vision system has been designed to be integrated into the 8×8 Dragon’s Mission System, which has also been developed by Indra to act as the armoured vehicle’s brain, controlling all the vehicle’s sensors and subsystems. In turn, this kind of technology helps enrich the tactical vision managed by higher level tools such as the Battlefield Management System (BMS) that is currently integrated into the Army’s armoured and combat vehicles. This is also based on Indra’s technology and serves to facilitate coordination and exchanges of information between the units deployed during an operation.
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