What’s Next? by Thales

This podcast features Nick Ernest, the North American Expert on AI for Thales, discussing Thales’ unique approach to artificial intelligence, why it’s significantly different from other forms of AI on the market and how it can safely enhance the performance of U.S. military helicopter crews operating on tomorrow’s battlefield. The U.S. military is counting on this futuristic technology to play a significant role in its modernization efforts and enhance its effectiveness in potential conflicts.

The 10-minute podcast features Paul Kobos (Banking Solutions Expert) talking about the Thales’ eco-friendly banking card effort – a global program aimed at drastically reducing the amount of harmful plastics used in standard payment cards from polluting the world’s oceans. Last year, Thales produced about 25 million eco-friendly payment cards using a byproduct of field corn and recycled plastics.

The podcast features Kristopher Chester, a former U.S. Special Operations targeting expert, talk about how Thales has a new tech can help today’s special operators and other ground combat forces call in precision fires against enemy targets on a GPS-denied battlefield – a critical challenging the U.S. military must overcome on the future battlefield.

In this episode Franco Fenoglio, Head of Human Planetary Exploration at Thales Alenia Space, describes the specialized living quarters that Thales Alenia Space is designing for astronauts of the Artemis mission – NASA’s official return to lunar exploration after the Apollo Mission ended more than five decades ago. These pressurized habitat modules will be a vital part of the Artemis mission’s Lunar Gateway, which will serve as an outpost orbiting the Moon to support sustainable, long-term human life on the lunar surface, as well as a staging point for deep space exploration.

In this episode, we talk to Mark Bock Mark, former U.S. Navy captain and Vice President for Strategy at Advanced Acoustic Concepts (AAC) talks about how Thales and AAC are helping the Navy become more efficient at hunting enemy submarines. Mark describes what the CAPTAS-4 Variable Depth Sonar brings to the Navy’s newest Frigate— and how it will help it locate enemy subs hiding in depths that other sonars in the fleet cannot penetrate.

This episode explores how Thales’ Digital ID technology is being used in an American Airlines pilot program that’s designed to dramatically reduce the time travelers waste standing in TSA screening lines at airports around the country. Amol Deshmukh, the North American expert for Digital ID and Biometrics at Thales, describes how Thales creates secure, smartphone-based driver’s licenses and passports so eligible passengers no longer need to show their physical ID during TSA screenings.

Thales’ COBALT Mission Backbone is an interconnected system of systems designed to meet the Canadian Armed Forces’ ambitious mission needs – now and into the future. Embodying innovation and collaboration, COBALT combines the best solutions from Thales and Canadian small- and medium-sized businesses to enable faster, better choices in decisive moments across the full spectrum of joint, pan-domain operations. Neil Marshall, a career signals officer with the Canadian Army, shares his passion for enabling the Canadian Armed Forces with advanced C4ISR capabilities and discusses how COBALT can serve as the backbone of the digital pivot the Canadian Army is seeking to make.

Robert Burns, Chief Product Security Officer for Thales Cloud Protection & Licensing explores what we could expect to happen in a large-scale cyber-attack on North America, and the realities and myths of cyberattacks orchestrated by powerful nation states.

Rotary-wing programs expert Ryan Walters discusses Thales’ new binocular-style Helmet Mounted Display (HMD). The display was created for the Future Long Rang Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) and the Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA)— two new helicopters that the U.S. Army is developing under its Future Vertical Lift (FVL) program. Walters, a former member of the U.S. Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment and aviator with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, explores why Army aviators will need the advanced situational awareness capabilities this new HMD offers when flying FVL aircraft on complex and dangerous missions on the future battlefield.

As combat troops continue to struggle to identify the location of enemy fire in noisy, chaotic combat conditions, Thales saw the need for an advanced Acusonic system that would accurately sense and report the direction of incoming enemy fire, giving a vehicle’s crew critical situational awareness. In this episode, Tim Riley, the North American expert for threat detection systems at Thales, discusses why our Acusonic system is one of the most advanced and accurate acoustic gunshot detection systems on the market. He also explores how Thales will incorporate the system onto U.S. combat vehicles.