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- [Narrator] Welcome back
to "Defense News Weekly."

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The ability to own the night

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has long been a specialty
of the US military.

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But new advances have
made seeing in low light

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or obscured conditions
better in recent years,

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potentially creating an
even greater advantage.

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We visited Elbit America

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to see new solutions they're working on

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to improve night vision.

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Check it out.

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(bouncy music)

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- So we're here at Elbit America

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to look at some night vision devices.

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Henry, tell us a little bit about

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what we see in front of us.

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- All right, so what
you got in front of you

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is enhanced night vision
Goggle binocular AN/PSQ-44.

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Comprised of four main components.

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You got your night vision viewer,

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positioning assembly binocular,

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universal helmet mount assembly,

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and the battery pack.

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Clip it all together,

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powered by four L91 lithium AA batteries.

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And now you have one

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of the most advanced night vision products

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available in the market today.

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It contains two high
performance image intensifiers.

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One 640 by 480 thermal imager.

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And they're optically fused

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so that the viewer is
able to see both thermal

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and image-intensified
imagery simultaneously.

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This is a squad binocular
night vision goggle

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fielded by the US Marine Corps.

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Both systems share some common traits.

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Both are image-intensified binoculars,

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both have side stow capability,

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both share the same tube type
and both have thermal imagers.

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The enhanced night vision goggle binocular

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in addition to an all weather,
day or night thermal imager

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and your tubes,

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it also has intra-soldier
wireless capability.

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So you can link in, let's
say drone feeds, okay,

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vehicle camera feeds,

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thermal image from your weapon site feeds

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all in the user's eye.

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The squad binocular night
vision goggle, SBNVG for short,

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has an external clip on
thermal imager, ECOTI.

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Its image is projected into
the image-intensified tube.

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Native fusing means I have a camera,

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and inside I have your classic

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image-intensifier night vision tube.

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The thermal image is
projected on a display inside,

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and then it is actually combined
in a beam combiner prism.

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There's two images

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that the user sees it in
their eye simultaneously,

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or they can see them independently.

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- So the night vision

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in the ENVG Bravo has different settings.

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We'll see a little sample of that,

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but to describe about what we're seeing

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if we switch between the
settings on the device.

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- Sure.

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So if you're looking at a scene,

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you have three options.

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You have white hot, so hotter
objects appear brighter.

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You have black hot,

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where hotter objects
actually appear darker.

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And then you have outline.

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Now outline's cool.

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Outline actually shows you like

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if you're looking at a person,
you'll see their outline,

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but you won't see them
as a big white blob.

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Most users when walking a
route, they use outline.

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Outline is the most useful

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because nature doesn't do straight lines.

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And if you ever noticed this,

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nature never ever does straight lines.

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In a thermal, straight lines and outline,

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they pop out immediately.

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- One of the things that's really

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a great feature about this, like you said,

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is that is that capability of having it

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all be able to transfer back and forth

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to the goggle from one device.

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It also has its own power supply.

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Can you talk a little bit about

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kind of how this thing is powered,

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how long it can last

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and kind of how all this fits together?

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- Sure, I can do that.

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So power is provided in the battery pack

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by four lithium batteries.

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You can buy these on the shelf.

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Depending on your operating mode,

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operating life is anywhere
between 4 hours and 10 hours.

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It depends on how many
of the features you use.

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It's kind of like your car.

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The faster you drive it, the
faster you burn gas, right?

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Same's true for the goggle.

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- So I understand that has
a lot of great capabilities

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with just a few batteries,

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but what can this device do

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with the battery power it has?

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- Okay, the one battery
it has on the bridge

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can run the two tubes in
the binocular for 20 hours.

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The CR123 cell, it has an ECOTI.

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It can run the ECOTI for three hours.

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It also has an external
battery pack available

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that can extend the run life
of the ECOTI and the binocular.

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- So we have some advanced
features on the ENVG

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compared to this device,

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but both of these devices
are new and being used.

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What about say the PVS-14

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or the older devices that
people are currently carrying,

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what kind of features does
this have that does not?

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- Okay, so PVS-14 is a
monocular night vision device.

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It's probably the most ubiquitous

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night vision device in the world.

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This gives you two big
advantages right off the bat.

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Two tubes means you get binocular vision.

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You get depth perception in low light.

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You also gain your thermal imager.

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Thermal imager breaks camouflage, okay?

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It means if a guy's wearing digis,

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and he's hiding in a tree

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and you can't see him with night vision,

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thermal imager, he'll pop out.

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He'll be the only thing you see.

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All right, the ENVG also gives
you wireless connectivity.

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That's critical.

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The things you see where
people shoot around corners.

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Yeah, that's real.

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The ENVG enables that capability, okay?

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The ENVG enables drone feeds.

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It enables what we call
augmented reality, okay?

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AR is navigation.

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So when you're doing land
nav, you're walking around,

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you're not stopping
looking down at your map,

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having to shine a light.

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No, no, no, it's in your eye.

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You see it the whole time.

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Full situational awareness
of the battlefield.

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You can do blue force tracking

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so you know where all your
squad mates are in real time.

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- So you can see more than
just what's in front of you.

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You can see feeds coming
from other places.

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You can also see more detail and depth

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on the terrain you're featuring,

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and as you said,

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you can break up camouflage and see people

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that otherwise could hide from you.

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- Absolutely.

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- And what about the durability?

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Obviously, you know,
marines are gonna get,

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they're gonna get wet.

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It's gonna be, you know,
maritime environment.

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You know soldiers are
gonna get wet and cold too,

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and the heat.

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Can this operate in like
extreme temperatures

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of heat or cold?

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- Absolutely.

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Both systems can operate
between -40 Fahrenheit

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all the way up to, basically 49 degrees C,

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it's hot.

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That's midday Fallujah hot, okay?

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Doesn't bother them.

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They work fine no matter the temperature.

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Immersion, enhanced night
vision goggle binocular

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is rated for one meter
of powered immersion

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and we test it on every goggle we sell.

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The SBNVG, the goggle itself
is rated for 20 meters.

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Like, Frogman depths, okay?

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The ECOTI itself is not
rated for nearly as deep,

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but thermal doesn't
work underwater anyway.

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So you're not using it there.

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You know, it'll be in your dive back.

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- Now, I know the Army is specifically,

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the Marine Corps as well,

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very interested in what
they like to call modular,

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being able to upgrade systems

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without replacing the whole thing.

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Now obviously you guys are talking

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about design changes
that can work over time

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and you can work with
those with the customer.

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As far as software,

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anything you can kind
of plug in, plug out,

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basically, talk about that.

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- Yeah, so first of all,
battery pack clips on, right?

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I wanna upgrade this,

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I don't have to send this whole kit back.

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This battery pack can be completely

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disassembled by fort maintenance.

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We have demonstrated that.

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The brain in it is upgradeable.

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We have to work out a program

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with the army to be able to do that.

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But it absolutely, if they say we want

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to enhance the capability
for, a good example,

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they wanted to add a weapon site reticle.

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The type that they hadn't had before.

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They called us up and said,
"Hey, can you do this?"

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We said, "Yeah, give us
three weeks. No problem."

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Added it, range tested, it it works great.

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Army says, "I want that. Put it in there."

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A month later, boom, rolled out.

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Just like that.

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All right, now you talk about
enhancements in the goggle.

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Now this I'm particularly proud of.

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Each of these monoculars

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where you have your night vision tubes,

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they're held on by four screws.

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That's it.

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I take those four screws out.

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I can take that off there.

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It's great for serviceability,
great for maintainability,

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but it's also great for
upgradeability to your point.

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Let's say I have

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a new completely new
night vision device type.

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And I say, "This thing is awesome.

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Better than any tube ever built."

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I wanna change it out.

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All we gotta do, we build
these up in the factory.

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As you can see, it's nice and clean.

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We can align it, bolt it on,

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it's plug and play, rock and roll.

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Same for this monocular
with the thermal camera.

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Let's say there's some

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great new thermal imager
technology comes out, right?

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We design a monocular that
bolts up to this interface.

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Four bolts, pop this one
off, pop your new one on,

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bolt it on, plug and play, rock and roll.

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It's that easy. Five minutes, you're done.