Lidar technology company AEye partnered with digital system integrator and data-driven artificial intelligence (AI) company Booz Allen Hamilton to productize and drive adoption of AEye’s technology for aerospace and defense (A&D) applications. With the accelerated activity in these markets, the company also opened an office in Florida’s “Space Coast” region, and hired veteran defense systems engineering leader Steve Frey, a Lockheed Martin and L3Harris Technologies alum, as its vice president of business development for A&D. “Aerospace and defense applications must be able to see, classify, and respond to an object in real time, at high speeds, and at long distances. AEye’s 4Sight software-definable lidar system, with its adaptive sensor-based operating system, uniquely meets these challenging demands,” said Blair LaCorte, CEO of AEye. “We are collaborating with Booz Allen Hamilton to optimize its real-time embedded processor perception stack. This aligns with Booz Allen’s digital battlespace vision for an information-driven, fully integrated conflict space extending across all warfighting domains, enabled by technology like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), and edge computing to realize information superiority and achieve overmatch.” Booz Allen has developed a client toolkit for assessing the performance of ML and AI, fusing data from multiple sensors — including lidar, camera, and radar — and virtualizing perception data for optimized mapping onto embedded processors to fully support situational awareness for the military. This toolkit accelerates AEye’s 4Sight Intelligent Sensing Platform time-to-market into the A&D markets. AEye’s 4Sight sensors make long-range detections, exceeding 1 km. They are flexible enough to track a bullet at 25,000 frames per second, and they can either cue off of other sensors or self-cue, subsequently adapting to place high-density regions of interest around targets. These capabilities, enabled by 4Sight’s in-sensor perception, greatly expand the utility of AI and ML for defense applications and, ultimately, save lives, the company said. Beyond defense, AEye said it plans to use the perception stack advancements being developed in conjunction with Booz Allen in various edge computing environments with its automotive and industrial customer base. Steve Frey has more than 35 years of experience in optics, photonics, systems engineering, and technical team leadership. The majority of his career was spent at Lockheed Martin, where he designed and later oversaw, as the director of applied research, the development of advanced IR imaging systems, laser systems, missiles, advanced targeting algorithms, and other mission-critical defense projects. At Lockheed, Frey worked with AEye founder Luis Dussan on developing leading-edge defense technology, including remote sensing using lasers and photonics, and ensuring that technology’s usability in the battlefield. AEye’s Florida office opening follows the company’s earlier expansion into Europe, Japan, and Korea.