JERUSALEM — The follow-on contract awarded to Israeli firm Smart Shooter by the US Marine Corps earlier this month may not have had the biggest price tag at $3.4 million, but a company executive said it was only the latest evidence that US armed forces are eager for troop-level counter-drone solutions — so much so that most service branches now have a Smart Shooter contract.
Scott Thompson, Smart Shooter vice president and general manager for US operations, told Breaking Defense the necessity for dismounted c-UAS has been a “common denominator among all these awards we have received in the last six to eight months.”
Smart Shooter makes a rifle-mounted fire control system called Smash 2000LE that is designed to digitally identify targets and, in Thompson’s words, “will release the round when [the system] thinks it has the highest probability” of hitting the target. The goal is to make rifle fire far more accurate per round, an especially daunting challenge when soldiers are firing at small and fast-moving drones overhead.
The Marine Corps’ contract was signed June 9, following on a string of similar contracts from across the US military. On June 1 the company announced its first $1.8 million contract with the US Navy, with delivery expected later this year. On May 11, the company announced a follow-on $10.7 million order from the US Army.
