Augusta Systems Technologies Demonstrated in Unmanned Systems Flight Test
Technologies power on-board sensor data processing

Morgantown, W.Va. -- Instead of streaming any and all data back to personnel on the ground, small unmanned aircraft can now be configured to select and transmit only the most useful data, thanks to the successful flight test of unmanned vehicles equipped with on-board sensor processing capabilities developed by Augusta Systems.

“Thanks to our technologies, these vehicles can now act with greater intelligence within network-centric operations, processing and transmitting the most important sensor data,” said Patrick Esposito II, president and chief operating officer of Augusta Systems. “This is a breakthrough for military personnel and a force multiplier since it allows the unmanned systems to do the data processing that ground personnel would normally perform. Instead of functioning as flying cameras, the vehicles become flying computers, capable of supporting a host of intelligent functions and algorithms.”

Augusta Systems, a provider of technologies to reduce deployment and management costs of sensor systems, networks and applications, participated in the Naval Air Systems Command flight test, along with representatives from AAI Corporation, a United Industrial Corporation subsidiary, and others. The flight tests were held at a National Aeronautics and Space Administration facility on Wallops Island, Va.

For the flight tests, the company’s sensor processing devices were coupled with code produced through its SensorBridge software and used on-board AAI’s Aerosonde Mk 4 vehicles. SensorBridge, a development platform for Microsoft Visual Studio 2005, featuring authoring tools and run-time components, powers rapid integration of diverse sensor data into existing systems, streamlines development of new sensor systems and applications and enables flexible management of sensor systems and networks. In network-centric applications, SensorBridge can power data interfacing, data filtering and data fusion functions, among others.

The Augusta Systems technologies enabled the vehicles to process video sensor data on-board the aircraft and transmit only relevant data back to personnel on the ground. Normally, the vehicles would stream all data back to the ground personnel, who would then have to sift through the data looking for useful information.

“By placing SensorBridge code and our sensor processing systems on board, we’ve essentially provided the vehicles with the brains to choose the most important data,” said Esposito. “Our technologies can provide maximum mission performance and enhance the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities of the unmanned systems.”

About Augusta Systems:
Augusta Systems, Inc. (Augusta Systems™) provides technologies to engineers and software developers to reduce deployment and management costs of sensor systems, networks and applications. These technologies enable the most efficient and effective use and convergence of sensor data to assist business, industry and government with managing the data overload resulting from wide-scale sensor deployments for security, monitoring and asset tracking.

The company’s flagship technology is SensorBridge™, a development platform for Microsoft Visual Studio 2005, featuring authoring tools and run-time components, that powers rapid integration of diverse sensor data into existing systems, streamlines development of new sensor systems and applications and enables flexible management of sensor systems and networks. Other products include sensor processing and aggregation technologies, which provide processing, aggregation and transmission of sensor data in mobile, remote and stationary applications. These technologies enable sensors and sensor networks, wireless sensors and wireless sensor networks (including Zigbee), RFID systems, IPv6 and netcentric systems, physical/IT security convergence and more.