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By B.C. Kessner
TEL AVIV, Israel--Officials from Pioneer UAV Inc. (PUI) recently outlined several upcoming improvements to the Marine Corps' Pioneer unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) aimed at maintaining relevancy as well as immediately increasing combat intelligence collection and dissemination capabilities for the legacy system.
Replacing datalinks, avionics, the ground control station and several supporting components of the Pioneer system are the near- term priorities for PUI, Bruce Albrecht, the company's president, and Craig Ballard, vice president for programs, told Defense Daily in an interview here on Wednesday.
The pair was in Israel this week discussing business related to these and future upgrades with Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI) and other local industry officials (Defense Daily, Apr. 22). PUI is the Hunt Valley, Md.-based joint venture between IAI and United Industrial Corp.'s [UIC] AAI subsidiary.
Once a Pioneer improvement program, the venture was modified to a system sustainment program to address obsolescence as the Marie Corps planned for the UAV's replacement, Albrecht said.
But with Pioneer again in combat service over Iraq and no replacement slated until about 2012, PUI is digging back into its...