BlueHalo has secured a $30 million contract to provide the Netherlands with an advanced Stinger trainer system.
The Virginia-based company signed the deal with the Netherlands Ministry of Defense Materiel and IT Command at Lieutenant General Best Barracks in Vredepeel.
Under the agreement, the organization will develop and deliver the required AST, an immersive Man-Portable Air Defense System that provides Stinger teams with tactical virtual training to address multiple air threats.
According to Jimmy Jenkins, sector president at BlueHalo, the company’s AST will enable warfighters to familiarize themselves with the equipment and develop the required skills through virtual reality training.
He added that the technology is designed to improve warfighter effectiveness with the Stinger missile while reducing the need for costly and complex live fire testing.
BlueHalo said the AST can simultaneously train up to four interoperable Stinger teams within its 360-degree high-resolution VR environment.
The system’s VR technology offers authentic terrain and battlespace environments with surround sound to deliver a realistic multidimensional experience.
The AST also features an Instructor Operator Station that provides control of the environments, threats and difficulty for every training scenario. Additionally, the station allows operators to access and review detailed scoring and analytics from each session.
When operating the AST, gunners use an untethered MANPADS replica of a Stinger missile while team leaders employ binoculars with positional auto-zoom to help navigate their gunners to targets.
BlueHalo CEO Jonathan Moneymaker, a 2022 Wash100 Award recipient, said the contract award highlights the company’s continuing efforts to disrupt and transform the global defense technology market.
