GECO Inc., a rapidly growing aerospace technology company, has been selected to provide essential ground control system hardware that will enable secure, universal communications for unmanned U.S. Army aviation.
GECO is one of eight companies awarded a $248 million Indefinite Delivery Infinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract to build production versions of the Tactical Open Government-Owned Architecture (TOGA) Hand Held Ground Control Station (H-GCS). The contract also includes spare and repair parts.
The TOGA H-GCS is the next generation of hand-held controller for the Army’s tactical unmanned aircraft systems (UASs), including the RQ-11 Raven and the RQ-20 Puma. It is also designed to control unmanned ground vehicles and will provide the soldier a compact, man-portable system to perform reconnaissance missions and control unmanned systems with a single, universal device.
The contract calls for replacement of up to 5,500 controllers. Low-rate production is expected to begin in 2019 with full-rate production starting in 2020.
“The GECO H-GCS has been in development since November 2016, and this award validates the work done to date while enabling a positive, ongoing partnership with the U.S. Army,” said GECO president Jennifer Graves. “Programs like this represent the future of aerospace, and we are proud to help further our customer’s strategic priorities.”
Graves said the GECO team is excited about the role they will play in one of the aerospace industry’s most talked-about markets, and she welcomes the opportunity it provides to showcase GECO’s broad capabilities April 25 to 27 at the 2018 Army Aviation Mission Solutions Summit (Booth 1006) in Nashville, Tennessee.
In addition to its ability to develop and integrate unmanned aerial systems, GECO’s products include cutting-edge mission processors, configurable touch displays, and secure video processing.
