Reveal Imaging awarded $3.9 million for personnel inspection system

Published 22 October 2009

The company said it plans to use multiple sensor technologies and automation to avoid the need for human operators to separate threats from harmless objects using multiple monitors

Bedford, Massachusetts-based airport security equipment maker Reveal Imaging Technologies Inc. reports it has landed $3.9 million from DHS for a personnel inspection system. Under the contract, Reveal Imaging will conduct a feasibility study and test and develop an algorithm for a prototype of an automated personnel inspection system. The company said it plans to use multiple sensor technologies and automation to avoid the need for human operators to separate threats from harmless objects using multiple monitors. The system will use broadband acoustic sensors and broadband active millimeter wave sensors to detect the properties of different kinds of materials.

Last month, Reveal pulled in a $30 million deal to provide its CT-80 DR explosives detection systems to the U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA), as part of the national stimulus funding package (28 September 2009 HSNW).

MassighTech notes that Reveal, which was formed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks in 2001, has carved a niche in bringing smaller baggage-screening technology to the aviation industry, which is required to inspect every package and bag going onto an airplane. The company started shipping products in 2005 and has installed 200 units worldwide — with 70 in U.S. airports. It raised $20.1 million in funding in March 2008 from fifteen investors listed in a regulatory filing, including previous backers General Catalyst of Cambridge, Flybridge Capital Partners of Boston (formerly IDG Ventures Boston) and Greylock Partners of Waltham. Reveal also added a new investor, Brown Brothers Harriman of Boston.