Army orders additional counter-IED robots

BEDFORD, Mass., Feb. 11 (UPI) -- The U.S. Army has placed another order for roadside bomb detection robots, under a contract with iRobot, for use in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Massachusetts-based iRobot Corp. received the new order from the Army Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation. Under the $7.8 million deal, iRobot will deliver another 90 of its iRobot PackBot 510 robots with the company's FasTac Kits.

The order, which also includes spare parts, marks the ninth order under a $286 million indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contract with the Army. The PackBot 510 robots are widely deployed to keep soldiers at a safe distance while on missions to identify improvised explosive devices and other threats in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"The PackBot 510 with FasTac Kit is a battle-proven tool, and this latest order shows the Army's commitment to employing these robots in even greater numbers moving forward," Joe Dyer, iRobot Government and Industrial Robots president, said in a statement.