QinetiQ breaks into US defence sonar market with US$7.7m contract

QinetiQ has won a US $7.7m (£4.1m) three year contract from Bluefin Robotics Corporation in the USA to deliver synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) for use with Bluefin-12 unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs). The SAS will ensure the Bluefin UUVs record high resolution seabed data images at high area coverage rates. This is the first multiple order for QinetiQ's SAS technology and a major breakthrough for the company in this highly competitive area of the US defence market.

The total US $17,956,137 contract was awarded to Bluefin by the US Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) to design, develop and test Increment 2 of their unmanned UUVs for surface mine countermeasures.

QinetiQ's Group Managing Director for Defence and Technology, Andrew Sleigh, said: "The SAS system builds on our longstanding research in sonar technology and we are pleased to work with Bluefin to deliver advanced capabilities to the US Navy. It complements our previous delivery of unmanned vehicles for mine countermeasures operations to the Royal Navy, a system that helped clear mines from a key strategic waterway in Iraq."

The CEO of Bluefin, Dr Brian Abraham, said: "We are very excited about the award of this contract. It allows us to expand our support of NAVSEA leveraging our experience and leading edge technologies with the Littoral Combat Ship Program and to expand our corporate collaboration with QinetiQ.� In September 2005, NAVSEA awarded Bluefin a contract to provide the Littoral Combat Ship program with Bluefin-21.

QinetiQ's SAS systems will be manufactured at QinetiQ's Winfrith site in Dorset in the UK and will be integrated into the Bluefin-12 UUVs at Bluefin's headquarters site in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the US.