Taking research to the bank

Behind the doors of BAE Systems' Advanced Technology Center.

According to Alan Levenston, Head of BAE Systems' Advanced Technology Center (ATC), the center's “scope ranges from immature bright ideas to defining mature, viable, and appropriate systems for products to be developed by our business units and manufactured by the company. Our role is to find out what is going on, to make assessments of worth and commercial possibilities in the defense and aerospace sectors, and to pick what we believe to have real potential. Our particular value is getting the risk out of projects and creating new opportunities, working in the parallel domains of technology and engineering.” ATC was formed in 2000 soon after the creation of BAE Systems, following the merger of British Aerospace with GEC-Marconi.

The link between research and product within the aerospace industry has sometimes been tenuous. “But now the emphasis is very much to strengthen that link as we study possible new opportunities,” said Levenston. “In the past, BAE Systems' research operated across a very broad spectrum. Now we are very focused-but even so, we need to be aware of opportunities outside of our traditional areas.”