Three years ago, InterSense Inc., a technology firm whose work finds its way into military hardware ranging from pilot trainers to simulators that train soldiers to steer Stinger missiles, made a high-stakes bet. It gambled that the helmet worn by the soldier of the future would bring his commanders as close as his 3-D audio speakers, enabling him to hear commands and information from other soldiers, even amid the din of the battlefield. What's more, sensors could give him a visual map of the positions of friendly and enemy troops.
Acknowledging that the company was too small to go it alone as a prime military contractor on the project, the technology maker forged ties to a pair of other military contractors to make a grab for millions in military funding earmarked for high-tech battle uniforms.
When those initial partners fell away, Bedford-based InterSense partnered with others. The group has crafted prototypes and hopes to sell the military on the helmet, a milestone that could, for $10 million-sales, 29-person InterSense mean a share of a deal that would put the technology on thousands of soldiers in years to come. This early in the military's product selection process, it's almost impossible for InterSense to know the value of such a contract.
"It's a tremendous opportunity for us," said InterSense Marketing Manager Dean Wormell. "The idea of putting a sensor on every soldier is a very large market."
InterSense is one of 26 Bay State companies that have captured some 95 percent of an estimated $6.9 billion expected to be spent in New England in the U.S. Army's Future Combat System program. While defense giants like Raytheon Co. and GE Aircraft Engines regularly seal headline-making deals, small technology innovators like InterSense are among the cadre of Bay State companies queuing up for a share of the Pentagon windfall.
Massachusetts' high-tech know-how fits the general philosophy of the Future Combat System program, the Army's attempt to equip a "faster, more agile force with superior situational awareness and power projection capability," says the program's Web site.
Touted as the Army's modernization program, Future Combat's goal is a networked system of soldier equipment and unmanned air and ground devices that gives troops instant information about battlefield threats while reducing command center support needs.
Textron Systems Corp. of Wilmington, which makes remote, expendable reconnaissance sensors, and iRobot Inc., the Burlington maker of remote-controlled robots used to spy danger in urban settings, are among the Massachusetts-based prime contractors tapping into the Future Combat program -- meaning the military purchases the finished products from them.
Other companies hoping to capture subcontract roles in the Future Combat program include computing and graphic modeling software maker MathWorks Inc. The $350 million-sales company already counts the aerospace and defense industry as its top customer group, and the Future Combat program is a prime example of the type of software-intensive military programs driving those sales, said Dan Raun, the industry manager for aerospace and defense at Natick-based MathWork
