iRobot and ICx team up for $16 million Army contract

More good news for iRobot’s efforts to conquer the explosives and WMD detection business. Last year we reported that the company’s PackBot had been selected by the U.S. Army to carry Smiths Detection’s Lightweight Chemical Detector system — a good sign of growing interest in marrying sensor systems to remote controplled robots. Now we can report on a similar deal: Stillwater, Oklahoma-based ICx Technologies has come to an agreement with iRobot to bring together the PackBot with ICx’s Fido Explosives Detectors.

Under the $16.5 million contract with DoD’s Joint Ground Robotics Enterprise (JGRE), 100 such combined systems will be delivered. In the integrated ido-Packbot system, the Fido sensor head and a separate communications interface are attached to the robot, while explosive detection results appear on an operator control unit. “iRobot PackBot’s all-digital architecture allows for easy and fast integration of new life-saving capabilities, such as the ICx Fido,” said iRobot’s Joe Dyer. More than 800 PackBots are now currently in service in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

-read more in this company news release

BLUE BOX

How it works:

Man’s best friend is a dog, but a dog’s best friend may be the Fido XT Explosives Detector, a portable ultra-sensitive device manufactured by Stillwater, Oklahoma-based ICx Nomadics. National Park Police are currently using the Fido XT as an adjunct bomb-sniffing device alongside canine patrols, not to replace them but rather to enhance the live Fido’s accuracy. “We do not want to say in any way, shape or form that we are better than dogs,” said ICx’s John Sikes. “Dogs are much faster and more efficient than anything else out there, but their side-by-side operations with Fido produced uncanny results.” The handheld, three pound instrument can even be mounted on a robot, an application suitable to a dog imitator. “It is truly amazing to see these robots maneuver and search for scent using the Fido sensor; they really look like high tech dogs working to find explosive devices,” said Kip Schultz, a canine trainer/instructor with ICx Nomadics. The only difference is the Fido XT does not try and eat his handler’s roast beef sandwiches.

In fact, even using the Fido XT in its handheld configuration requires canine instincts. Dogs instinctively position their noses in the optimum way to expose their scent glands, and the human user must try to replicate the effort by thinking the way a dog thinks. “We’re talking about picking up the stuff you can’t see. When you enter in wind and different environmental conditions, using the device to screen does take some intelligence,” said Sikes. The Fido XT is so sensitive, in fact, that it can detect residue from a pistol that has not been fired in ten years.

In addition to the National Park Police, the Fido XT is in use at the Statue of Liberty and is being tested for use at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.