Lockheed Martin is supporting the U.S. Army Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center (TARDEC) as they develop a new prototype controller for military vehicle active protection systems. The controller will allow armored vehicles to have active protection systems that use a single, interchangeable processing unit, allowing for easy maintenance and mission flexibility.

Based on Lockheed Martin’s Open Architecture Processor, the prototype controller is designed to control and process information from the multiple sensors and self-defense systems that protect ground vehicles from threats. A single, flexible unit, the controller will also support rapid integration of new self-defense technologies to address evolving threats.

“The prototype controller will demonstrate the ability for future active protection systems to be easily repaired, upgraded or modified per mission requirements on vehicles such as the Abrams, Bradley and Stryker. Our soldiers can have the defenses they need when they need them.” said Terry Hoehn, Fire Control Advanced Programs Director at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control.

In the first phase of development, Lockheed Martin will deliver four prototype controllers to TARDEC, along with training and a software demonstration.

The Open Architecture Processor is one of the first products to emerge from Lockheed Martin’s Processors Center of Excellence created last year at the company’s Missiles and Fire Control facility in Orlando, Florida. The Center is chartered to research data processing techniques and high-power computing for tactical environments.

Headquartered at the U.S. Army Detroit Arsenal in Warren, Michigan, TARDEC is a major research, development and engineering center for the Army Materiel Command's Research, Development and Engineering Command, and is an enterprise partner in the TACOM Life Cycle Management Command. TARDEC develops, integrates and sustains advanced manned and autonomy-enabled ground system capabilities that will reduce weight and the logistics tail, increase mobility and make the Army more expeditionary.