Business Weekly - Cambridge, UK

Plextek, the Cambridge-based electronics and communications design consultancy, is partnering with Bath-based picoChip to work on innovative wireless solutions for military communications.

These smaller, cheaper and more flexible standards-based communications solutions will offer clear benefits to field deployed military personnel tasked with setting up a secure communications infrastructure.
 
Plextek’s proven expertise is in developing cost effective defence solutions based on commercial off the shelf (COTS) technologies.
picoChip’s flexible picoArray architecture can support all major air-interfaces, and was explicitly designed for Software Defined Radio (SDR) applications. As such, it is well suited to military requirements such as Joint Tactical Radio System (JTRS).
 
Together Plextek and picoChip are able to achieve significant benefits supporting the delivery of Network Enabled Capability (NEC).

Communication is an essential function for military personnel. However, existing military infrastructure systems are often very large and power hungry making them slow to deploy and necessitating the transportation of large power sources.
 
Plextek and picoChip’s expertise will enable a much smaller, lightweight, flexible and more efficient infrastructure which is quicker and easier to deploy, possibly even ahead of the arrival of mobile forces. The solutions will be just as effective in both urban and rural environments.
 
Tim Phipps, sales & marketing director, Plextek comments: “The defence industry is currently striving to achieve NEC as it enables effective decision making and action through the timely provision and exploitation of information and intelligence.
 
“The wireless communications technologies we’re developing with picoChip have so many diverse and widespread usage scenarios in support of NEC.

“These could allow mobile phone communications in remote mountain areas, or the transfer of data, images and video, or even the control of unmanned aerial vehicles.”