Raytheon touts radio system

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FARNBOROUGH, England, July 13 (UPI) -- The U.S. Army will soon begin laboratory and field testing of a vehicular soldier radio system that connects dozens of different radio types on one network.

Raytheon said its Mobile Ad hoc Interoperability Network Gateway, which features the company's Next Generation Mobile Ad hoc Network Waveform, has so far connected 37 different types of radios from U.S. military and coalition partners.

MAINGATE, as it is called, has a 10 megabits-per-second capacity and 128-node scalability for fast, reliable interoperability for sharing voice, text and full-motion video across the battlefield.

"The unmatched 10 megabits-per-second capacity allows soldiers to view at least 27 videos at the same time," Raytheon said.

"Connecting our coalition partners on a single network is significant because each country typically has its own unique radio," said Jeff Miller, director of tactical communication systems for Raytheon's Network Centric Systems business. "Raytheon solves this long-standing problem and will test its open, non-proprietary waveform used in MAINGATE to show that we can provide an unprecedented on-the-move communications capability for our allies."

MAINGATE with NMW will be tested beginning this fall as part of the NIE 13.1 Coalition/Joint Participation at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., and White Sands Missile Range, N.M.

Raytheon said MAINGATE has already been deployed in theater for two years.