Who Makes Sony TVs and Where Are They Manufactured?
Sony designs Bravia TVs with premium features and high-quality displays, but many buyers are still unaware of where they are made. Sony uses a global manufacturing network that includes countries such as China, Japan, Malaysia, India, and Mexico. The company also depends on outside suppliers for important components like OLED and QD-OLED panels. Over time, Sony has reduced its own factory operations and started relying more on manufacturing partners, which has changed how and where Bravia TVs are produced today.
Sony Bravia
Sony Bravia became Sony’s main television brand in 2008 and is now sold in many countries worldwide. These TVs are popular for their premium display quality, color accuracy, and smart image-processing features. Sony develops the software, features, and designs for its TVs, while manufacturing partners produce and assemble the products. The company also depends on outside suppliers for important TV components like display panels.
Where Are Sony TVs Manufactured?
Sony Bravia TVs are manufactured across different countries as part of Sony’s global production network. Major manufacturing locations include China, Japan, India, Malaysia, Mexico, Slovakia, and Thailand. China handles a large share of TV assembly and display-related production, while India produces many TVs for regional buyers through Sony’s partnership with Foxconn. Japan and Malaysia still support several electronics manufacturing operations for the company. Different factories are used to serve nearby international markets and reduce supply costs.
Over time, Sony has been able to cut down on the number of factories that it has. This is because it used to manufacture TVs in factories that were in other countries like Brazil, Spain, Vietnam, Mexico, and Slovakia. In 2010, Sony sold the Spain facility, later closed the Brazil factory in 2021, and had previously shut down the Vietnam plant in 2008. It also sold the Mexican and Slovakian plants to Foxconn in its attempt to minimize costs.
Now, Sony emphasizes technology and product development more and relies on other firms in manufacturing. The firm Foxconn is responsible for making Sony TVs that support various markets. Outsourcing production will help Sony cut costs, become more efficient, and manufacture effectively from all corners of the globe.
Who Supplies Sony TV Panels?
Currently, Sony uses TV panels manufactured by other producers rather than creating them through its plants. The OLED panels used by Sony for its products come mostly from LG, while Samsung produces QD-OLED panels. There are a limited number of producers of TV panels; therefore, most TV makers use similar TV panels. Most of Sony’s development efforts focus on software and image processing.
Sony uses its own picture-processing systems and display tuning to improve the quality of Bravia TVs. These technologies help deliver better colors, sharper details, and smoother motion performance. Because of this, Sony delivers excellent image quality in its TVs even when other manufacturers supply the display panels.
TCL’s Role in Sony Bravia TVs
After acquiring the majority stake in Bravia Inc., TCL is a significant player in determining the future of Sony Bravia television sets. However, Sony will continue to use its imaging technologies and displays in order to create the perfect experience of using Bravia televisions. Given that TCL has a wide manufacturing base in China, there is an expectation that Bravia television manufacturing will increasingly shift to China post 2027.
Today, Sony Bravia TVs are produced using parts and factories from different countries across Sony’s global supply chain. Even so, Sony continues to handle the software and image-processing systems that shape the overall viewing experience. For most customers, Sony’s strong reputation for display quality matters more than the exact factory location of the TV.
Sony designs Bravia TVs with premium features and high-quality displays, but many buyers are still unaware of where they are made. Sony uses a global manufacturing network that includes countries such as China, Japan, Malaysia, India, and Mexico. The company also depends on outside suppliers for important components like OLED and QD-OLED panels. Over time, Sony has reduced its own factory operations and started relying more on manufacturing partners, which has changed how and where Bravia TVs are produced today.
Sony Bravia
Sony Bravia became Sony’s main television brand in 2008 and is now sold in many countries worldwide. These TVs are popular for their premium display quality, color accuracy, and smart image-processing features. Sony develops the software, features, and designs for its TVs, while manufacturing partners produce and assemble the products. The company also depends on outside suppliers for important TV components like display panels.
Where Are Sony TVs Manufactured?
Sony Bravia TVs are manufactured across different countries as part of Sony’s global production network. Major manufacturing locations include China, Japan, India, Malaysia, Mexico, Slovakia, and Thailand. China handles a large share of TV assembly and display-related production, while India produces many TVs for regional buyers through Sony’s partnership with Foxconn. Japan and Malaysia still support several electronics manufacturing operations for the company. Different factories are used to serve nearby international markets and reduce supply costs.
Over time, Sony has been able to cut down on the number of factories that it has. This is because it used to manufacture TVs in factories that were in other countries like Brazil, Spain, Vietnam, Mexico, and Slovakia. In 2010, Sony sold the Spain facility, later closed the Brazil factory in 2021, and had previously shut down the Vietnam plant in 2008. It also sold the Mexican and Slovakian plants to Foxconn in its attempt to minimize costs.
Now, Sony emphasizes technology and product development more and relies on other firms in manufacturing. The firm Foxconn is responsible for making Sony TVs that support various markets. Outsourcing production will help Sony cut costs, become more efficient, and manufacture effectively from all corners of the globe.
Who Supplies Sony TV Panels?
Currently, Sony uses TV panels manufactured by other producers rather than creating them through its plants. The OLED panels used by Sony for its products come mostly from LG, while Samsung produces QD-OLED panels. There are a limited number of producers of TV panels; therefore, most TV makers use similar TV panels. Most of Sony’s development efforts focus on software and image processing.
Sony uses its own picture-processing systems and display tuning to improve the quality of Bravia TVs. These technologies help deliver better colors, sharper details, and smoother motion performance. Because of this, Sony delivers excellent image quality in its TVs even when other manufacturers supply the display panels.
TCL’s Role in Sony Bravia TVs
After acquiring the majority stake in Bravia Inc., TCL is a significant player in determining the future of Sony Bravia television sets. However, Sony will continue to use its imaging technologies and displays in order to create the perfect experience of using Bravia televisions. Given that TCL has a wide manufacturing base in China, there is an expectation that Bravia television manufacturing will increasingly shift to China post 2027.
Today, Sony Bravia TVs are produced using parts and factories from different countries across Sony’s global supply chain. Even so, Sony continues to handle the software and image-processing systems that shape the overall viewing experience. For most customers, Sony’s strong reputation for display quality matters more than the exact factory location of the TV.
NVIDIA app, where you can install an updated driver in a few clicks.
Update NVIDIA Drivers Using the NVIDIA App
You can update your NVIDIA graphics drivers quickly through the NVIDIA app. If you don’t have the app, install it first. During installation, choose GeForce Game Ready Drivers for the best gaming experience or NVIDIA Studio Drivers for creative tasks like video editing and 3D design. Steps to update NVIDIA drivers:
In the NVIDIA app, there are two different kinds of drivers to choose from: Game Ready Drivers and Studio Drivers. If you play games often, then you should go with the Game Ready Driver. They include optimizations for games and compatibility with newly released titles. However, if you use creative tools such as Adobe Premiere Pro, Blender, and DaVinci Resolve, you should consider using the Studio Drivers, as they suit your purpose.
The NVIDIA app can automatically download new driver updates as soon as they become available. While the download happens in the background, you must still open the app and install the update yourself. To use this feature, go to Settings in the NVIDIA app and enable Automatically download drivers and let me choose when to install. Once enabled, new drivers download in the background, making future updates faster and more convenient.
How to Go Back to an Older NVIDIA Driver
If a new driver update causes any performance or compatibility problems, you can go back to the old driver. The NVIDIA software maintains a list of previously used drivers in the section called Previously Installed on the Drivers tab. Just click the three dots next to your chosen driver and select Reinstall.
In addition to the driver update tool, NVIDIA has several other helpful tools. One of them is an automatic optimization of game settings to improve their performance. It also supports NVIDIA ShadowPlay, which lets you record gameplay and take screenshots or video recordings. You can also check the Drivers page for updates on new games, driver releases, and NVIDIA features.
NVIDIA app, where you can install an updated driver in a few clicks.
Update NVIDIA Drivers Using the NVIDIA App
You can update your NVIDIA graphics drivers quickly through the NVIDIA app. If you don’t have the app, install it first. During installation, choose GeForce Game Ready Drivers for the best gaming experience or NVIDIA Studio Drivers for creative tasks like video editing and 3D design. Steps to update NVIDIA drivers:
In the NVIDIA app, there are two different kinds of drivers to choose from: Game Ready Drivers and Studio Drivers. If you play games often, then you should go with the Game Ready Driver. They include optimizations for games and compatibility with newly released titles. However, if you use creative tools such as Adobe Premiere Pro, Blender, and DaVinci Resolve, you should consider using the Studio Drivers, as they suit your purpose.
The NVIDIA app can automatically download new driver updates as soon as they become available. While the download happens in the background, you must still open the app and install the update yourself. To use this feature, go to Settings in the NVIDIA app and enable Automatically download drivers and let me choose when to install. Once enabled, new drivers download in the background, making future updates faster and more convenient.
How to Go Back to an Older NVIDIA Driver
If a new driver update causes any performance or compatibility problems, you can go back to the old driver. The NVIDIA software maintains a list of previously used drivers in the section called Previously Installed on the Drivers tab. Just click the three dots next to your chosen driver and select Reinstall.
In addition to the driver update tool, NVIDIA has several other helpful tools. One of them is an automatic optimization of game settings to improve their performance. It also supports NVIDIA ShadowPlay, which lets you record gameplay and take screenshots or video recordings. You can also check the Drivers page for updates on new games, driver releases, and NVIDIA features.
#Easily #Update #NVIDIA #DriversNVIDIA">How To Easily Update Your NVIDIA Drivers?
Whether you play games, create videos, or perform daily tasks on your computer, having up-to-date NVIDIA drivers is essential. NVIDIA drivers enable your graphics card to work effectively with Windows and programs installed on it. Upgrading your driver will improve performance, solve existing problems, make it more compatible with recently developed software, and offer new features. The most convenient method for upgrading your driver is to use the NVIDIA app, where you can install an updated driver in a few clicks.
Update NVIDIA Drivers Using the NVIDIA App
You can update your NVIDIA graphics drivers quickly through the NVIDIA app. If you don’t have the app, install it first. During installation, choose GeForce Game Ready Drivers for the best gaming experience or NVIDIA Studio Drivers for creative tasks like video editing and 3D design. Steps to update NVIDIA drivers:
In the NVIDIA app, there are two different kinds of drivers to choose from: Game Ready Drivers and Studio Drivers. If you play games often, then you should go with the Game Ready Driver. They include optimizations for games and compatibility with newly released titles. However, if you use creative tools such as Adobe Premiere Pro, Blender, and DaVinci Resolve, you should consider using the Studio Drivers, as they suit your purpose.
The NVIDIA app can automatically download new driver updates as soon as they become available. While the download happens in the background, you must still open the app and install the update yourself. To use this feature, go to Settings in the NVIDIA app and enable Automatically download drivers and let me choose when to install. Once enabled, new drivers download in the background, making future updates faster and more convenient.
How to Go Back to an Older NVIDIA Driver
If a new driver update causes any performance or compatibility problems, you can go back to the old driver. The NVIDIA software maintains a list of previously used drivers in the section called Previously Installed on the Drivers tab. Just click the three dots next to your chosen driver and select Reinstall.
In addition to the driver update tool, NVIDIA has several other helpful tools. One of them is an automatic optimization of game settings to improve their performance. It also supports NVIDIA ShadowPlay, which lets you record gameplay and take screenshots or video recordings. You can also check the Drivers page for updates on new games, driver releases, and NVIDIA features.
#Easily #Update #NVIDIA #DriversNVIDIA
Elon Musk’s SpaceX spent an eye-watering $18.4 billion in its first quarter as a publicly traded company and warned investors to expect similarly high spending in the next two financial quarters, sending the stock price down more than 8% in late trading on Tuesday evening. A whopping $15.8 billion of that spending was to power its artificial intelligence efforts, a division that ended the quarter with a $1.3 billion net operating loss.
The figure comes from the company’s first earnings report since the record-setting initial public offering hit the market in mid-June. Although the IPO was surely an amazing day for Musk, who briefly became the world’s first trillionaire, things have not been all peachy since then, with the stock price currently well below its IPO price. As of last week, the company’s stock was so far down from its IPO highs that the value it shed was roughly equal to Musk’s other company, Tesla’s, market capitalization. Tuesday’s stock sales are unlikely to help that scenario, and neither is the fact that the company’s first lockup period ends on Thursday, meaning some company insiders will be able to sell more than $100 billion worth of stock for the first time since SpaceX went public.
To ease some of those worries, Musk promised dramatic AI advancements.
“Our rate of growth certainly is faster than anyone else, and our efficiency of compute deployment I think is also the highest,” Musk claimed. “So we expect to end this year with over two gigawatts of compute, and probably our cumulative compute online by the end of next year will be several times higher.”
Those compute plans are ambitious, but Musk struck a defiant tone against any doubters in the earnings call on Tuesday.
“The terrestrial data centers are a trivial problem compared to making gigantic reusable rockets which are launched frequently,” Musk said.
Musk said SpaceX’s data centers will be exclusively built on Nvidia chips. The two companies are also partnering to build Starmind AI satellites, a part of SpaceX’s even more ambitious plan to put a giant colony of up to a million AI data centers in Earth’s orbit. Some experts are hesitant that Musk and his company will be able to pull off the space-based data center colony plan, while many have also raised concerns about the environmental, economic, and social impact of such a huge launch program if it does pan out as promised.
On the call, Musk said that SpaceX would begin launching the Starmind AI satellites in 2027.
The company will also be unveiling Grok 5 before the end of the year, which Musk said would be trained on “all the data that SpaceX has ever produced,” making the chatbot “by far the best engineer.” Musk has previously claimed the yet-to-be-unveiled LLM will be AGI-level, aka a contested hypothetical AI that would theoretically equal or beat all human capabilities.
“We expect the cadence of AI development to improve dramatically,” Musk said. “I think, by the end of next year, it’s not clear to me that there’s anything digital at least that AI won’t be able to do based on the current rate of improvement.”
All of this comes with a huge, obvious caveat: Musk has long had a penchant for overpromising. His hefty promises extended beyond the AI sphere on Tuesday as well, with the CEO claiming that the company’s space business would be launching a rocket a day by next year and that there will be robots working in manufacturing operations on the literal Moon.
“I know this sounds totally nuts, but you can probably scale to a thousand times the economy of Earth in terms of intelligence launched to space, but probably maybe even a million times,” Musk claimed. “We’re going to build the factories on the Moon; the robots will be helpful with that.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX spent an eye-watering $18.4 billion in its first quarter as a publicly traded company and warned investors to expect similarly high spending in the next two financial quarters, sending the stock price down more than 8% in late trading on Tuesday evening. A whopping $15.8 billion of that spending was to power its artificial intelligence efforts, a division that ended the quarter with a $1.3 billion net operating loss.
The figure comes from the company’s first earnings report since the record-setting initial public offering hit the market in mid-June. Although the IPO was surely an amazing day for Musk, who briefly became the world’s first trillionaire, things have not been all peachy since then, with the stock price currently well below its IPO price. As of last week, the company’s stock was so far down from its IPO highs that the value it shed was roughly equal to Musk’s other company, Tesla’s, market capitalization. Tuesday’s stock sales are unlikely to help that scenario, and neither is the fact that the company’s first lockup period ends on Thursday, meaning some company insiders will be able to sell more than $100 billion worth of stock for the first time since SpaceX went public.
To ease some of those worries, Musk promised dramatic AI advancements.
“Our rate of growth certainly is faster than anyone else, and our efficiency of compute deployment I think is also the highest,” Musk claimed. “So we expect to end this year with over two gigawatts of compute, and probably our cumulative compute online by the end of next year will be several times higher.”
Those compute plans are ambitious, but Musk struck a defiant tone against any doubters in the earnings call on Tuesday.
“The terrestrial data centers are a trivial problem compared to making gigantic reusable rockets which are launched frequently,” Musk said.
Musk said SpaceX’s data centers will be exclusively built on Nvidia chips. The two companies are also partnering to build Starmind AI satellites, a part of SpaceX’s even more ambitious plan to put a giant colony of up to a million AI data centers in Earth’s orbit. Some experts are hesitant that Musk and his company will be able to pull off the space-based data center colony plan, while many have also raised concerns about the environmental, economic, and social impact of such a huge launch program if it does pan out as promised.
On the call, Musk said that SpaceX would begin launching the Starmind AI satellites in 2027.
The company will also be unveiling Grok 5 before the end of the year, which Musk said would be trained on “all the data that SpaceX has ever produced,” making the chatbot “by far the best engineer.” Musk has previously claimed the yet-to-be-unveiled LLM will be AGI-level, aka a contested hypothetical AI that would theoretically equal or beat all human capabilities.
“We expect the cadence of AI development to improve dramatically,” Musk said. “I think, by the end of next year, it’s not clear to me that there’s anything digital at least that AI won’t be able to do based on the current rate of improvement.”
All of this comes with a huge, obvious caveat: Musk has long had a penchant for overpromising. His hefty promises extended beyond the AI sphere on Tuesday as well, with the CEO claiming that the company’s space business would be launching a rocket a day by next year and that there will be robots working in manufacturing operations on the literal Moon.
“I know this sounds totally nuts, but you can probably scale to a thousand times the economy of Earth in terms of intelligence launched to space, but probably maybe even a million times,” Musk claimed. “We’re going to build the factories on the Moon; the robots will be helpful with that.
#SpaceX #Stock #Drops #Earnings #Call #Musk #Fails #Woo #Investors #Goalscapex,Elon Musk,SPACEX">SpaceX Stock Drops After First Earnings Call as Musk Fails to Woo Investors With AI Goals
Elon Musk’s SpaceX spent an eye-watering $18.4 billion in its first quarter as a publicly traded company and warned investors to expect similarly high spending in the next two financial quarters, sending the stock price down more than 8% in late trading on Tuesday evening. A whopping $15.8 billion of that spending was to power its artificial intelligence efforts, a division that ended the quarter with a $1.3 billion net operating loss.
The figure comes from the company’s first earnings report since the record-setting initial public offering hit the market in mid-June. Although the IPO was surely an amazing day for Musk, who briefly became the world’s first trillionaire, things have not been all peachy since then, with the stock price currently well below its IPO price. As of last week, the company’s stock was so far down from its IPO highs that the value it shed was roughly equal to Musk’s other company, Tesla’s, market capitalization. Tuesday’s stock sales are unlikely to help that scenario, and neither is the fact that the company’s first lockup period ends on Thursday, meaning some company insiders will be able to sell more than $100 billion worth of stock for the first time since SpaceX went public.
To ease some of those worries, Musk promised dramatic AI advancements.
“Our rate of growth certainly is faster than anyone else, and our efficiency of compute deployment I think is also the highest,” Musk claimed. “So we expect to end this year with over two gigawatts of compute, and probably our cumulative compute online by the end of next year will be several times higher.”
Those compute plans are ambitious, but Musk struck a defiant tone against any doubters in the earnings call on Tuesday.
“The terrestrial data centers are a trivial problem compared to making gigantic reusable rockets which are launched frequently,” Musk said.
Musk said SpaceX’s data centers will be exclusively built on Nvidia chips. The two companies are also partnering to build Starmind AI satellites, a part of SpaceX’s even more ambitious plan to put a giant colony of up to a million AI data centers in Earth’s orbit. Some experts are hesitant that Musk and his company will be able to pull off the space-based data center colony plan, while many have also raised concerns about the environmental, economic, and social impact of such a huge launch program if it does pan out as promised.
On the call, Musk said that SpaceX would begin launching the Starmind AI satellites in 2027.
The company will also be unveiling Grok 5 before the end of the year, which Musk said would be trained on “all the data that SpaceX has ever produced,” making the chatbot “by far the best engineer.” Musk has previously claimed the yet-to-be-unveiled LLM will be AGI-level, aka a contested hypothetical AI that would theoretically equal or beat all human capabilities.
“We expect the cadence of AI development to improve dramatically,” Musk said. “I think, by the end of next year, it’s not clear to me that there’s anything digital at least that AI won’t be able to do based on the current rate of improvement.”
All of this comes with a huge, obvious caveat: Musk has long had a penchant for overpromising. His hefty promises extended beyond the AI sphere on Tuesday as well, with the CEO claiming that the company’s space business would be launching a rocket a day by next year and that there will be robots working in manufacturing operations on the literal Moon.
“I know this sounds totally nuts, but you can probably scale to a thousand times the economy of Earth in terms of intelligence launched to space, but probably maybe even a million times,” Musk claimed. “We’re going to build the factories on the Moon; the robots will be helpful with that.
real-life ray gun into a 747 to shoot down ballistic missiles and stuck a laser on top of a Humvee to zap roadside bombs. For more than 50 years, the United States military and its researchers have tried to develop laser weapons. None of them panned out.
But now, the US Army is about to make a working laser weapon an official part of its arsenal. The Pentagon is poised to sign a contract to acquire and rapidly deploy what’s called an Enduring High Energy Laser in and around bases across the world to defend them from drone attacks, according to sources familiar with the matter. The official announcement could come as early as this week. When the deal is signed, it will mark the first time that the US military will have committed to equipping its forces with laser weapons in significant numbers.
“For years, lasers were going to be the future, and they never really came to their own. Now, they’re actually coming to their own,” Mark J. Lewis, the former Air Force chief scientist, tells WIRED.
The Iran and Ukraine wars have shown that drones are now so cheap, so plentiful, and so deadly that they’re impossible to stop with any single countermeasure. Some of the traditional ones have been particularly clunky. During the early days of the Iran conflict, the US even resorted to firing $4 million Patriot missiles at $35,000 Iranian drones—a waste of money, and a move that depleted the American interceptor stockpile.
Modern lasers, on the other hand, never run out of ammunition. “Basically, you can keep firing them as long as you’ve got power,” Lewis says. “There are some other issues with lasers, including how rapidly you can refire and recharge. But if you solve those problems, then suddenly you’ve got a pretty nifty way to help counteract things like a drone swarm attack.”
That’s one reason why the US military, at this moment, has either deployed or is actively testing a half-dozen laser weapons systems, according to the Laser Wars newsletter. The Navy has installed laser “dazzlers” on two of its ships to blind drones’ electro-optical sensors. The Air Force’s command for Europe and Africa has sent Boeing’s Compact Laser Weapons System “to locations across the theater.” In late June, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth traveled to the Army’s test range in White Sands, New Mexico, for a demonstration of all sorts of directed-energy weapon projects.
Despite such mishaps, the Army appears ready to go beyond the one-offs and the experiments. In fact, in some ways, the accidental kill helped make the case for the laser, proving it could actually take out such a drone.
The Pentagon and its suppliers had been scrambling to field something, anything to defend against mass-produced, low-cost attack drones. They’ve rolled out radio frequency jammers, microwave weapons, an array of missiles, drones designed to kill other drones, even copies of the Iranian robots. None of them in isolation have been enough. On March 1, an Iranian drone killed six US service members and injured 30 others.
real-life ray gun into a 747 to shoot down ballistic missiles and stuck a laser on top of a Humvee to zap roadside bombs. For more than 50 years, the United States military and its researchers have tried to develop laser weapons. None of them panned out.
But now, the US Army is about to make a working laser weapon an official part of its arsenal. The Pentagon is poised to sign a contract to acquire and rapidly deploy what’s called an Enduring High Energy Laser in and around bases across the world to defend them from drone attacks, according to sources familiar with the matter. The official announcement could come as early as this week. When the deal is signed, it will mark the first time that the US military will have committed to equipping its forces with laser weapons in significant numbers.
“For years, lasers were going to be the future, and they never really came to their own. Now, they’re actually coming to their own,” Mark J. Lewis, the former Air Force chief scientist, tells WIRED.
The Iran and Ukraine wars have shown that drones are now so cheap, so plentiful, and so deadly that they’re impossible to stop with any single countermeasure. Some of the traditional ones have been particularly clunky. During the early days of the Iran conflict, the US even resorted to firing $4 million Patriot missiles at $35,000 Iranian drones—a waste of money, and a move that depleted the American interceptor stockpile.
Modern lasers, on the other hand, never run out of ammunition. “Basically, you can keep firing them as long as you’ve got power,” Lewis says. “There are some other issues with lasers, including how rapidly you can refire and recharge. But if you solve those problems, then suddenly you’ve got a pretty nifty way to help counteract things like a drone swarm attack.”
That’s one reason why the US military, at this moment, has either deployed or is actively testing a half-dozen laser weapons systems, according to the Laser Wars newsletter. The Navy has installed laser “dazzlers” on two of its ships to blind drones’ electro-optical sensors. The Air Force’s command for Europe and Africa has sent Boeing’s Compact Laser Weapons System “to locations across the theater.” In late June, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth traveled to the Army’s test range in White Sands, New Mexico, for a demonstration of all sorts of directed-energy weapon projects.
Despite such mishaps, the Army appears ready to go beyond the one-offs and the experiments. In fact, in some ways, the accidental kill helped make the case for the laser, proving it could actually take out such a drone.
The Pentagon and its suppliers had been scrambling to field something, anything to defend against mass-produced, low-cost attack drones. They’ve rolled out radio frequency jammers, microwave weapons, an array of missiles, drones designed to kill other drones, even copies of the Iranian robots. None of them in isolation have been enough. On March 1, an Iranian drone killed six US service members and injured 30 others.
#Landmark #Deal #Officially #Add #Laser #Weapons #Army #Arsenallasers,drones,weapons and ammo,iran,military,military tech,army">Landmark Deal Would Officially Add Laser Weapons to US Army Arsenal
They stuffed a real-life ray gun into a 747 to shoot down ballistic missiles and stuck a laser on top of a Humvee to zap roadside bombs. For more than 50 years, the United States military and its researchers have tried to develop laser weapons. None of them panned out.
But now, the US Army is about to make a working laser weapon an official part of its arsenal. The Pentagon is poised to sign a contract to acquire and rapidly deploy what’s called an Enduring High Energy Laser in and around bases across the world to defend them from drone attacks, according to sources familiar with the matter. The official announcement could come as early as this week. When the deal is signed, it will mark the first time that the US military will have committed to equipping its forces with laser weapons in significant numbers.
“For years, lasers were going to be the future, and they never really came to their own. Now, they’re actually coming to their own,” Mark J. Lewis, the former Air Force chief scientist, tells WIRED.
The Iran and Ukraine wars have shown that drones are now so cheap, so plentiful, and so deadly that they’re impossible to stop with any single countermeasure. Some of the traditional ones have been particularly clunky. During the early days of the Iran conflict, the US even resorted to firing $4 million Patriot missiles at $35,000 Iranian drones—a waste of money, and a move that depleted the American interceptor stockpile.
Modern lasers, on the other hand, never run out of ammunition. “Basically, you can keep firing them as long as you’ve got power,” Lewis says. “There are some other issues with lasers, including how rapidly you can refire and recharge. But if you solve those problems, then suddenly you’ve got a pretty nifty way to help counteract things like a drone swarm attack.”
That’s one reason why the US military, at this moment, has either deployed or is actively testing a half-dozen laser weapons systems, according to the Laser Wars newsletter. The Navy has installed laser “dazzlers” on two of its ships to blind drones’ electro-optical sensors. The Air Force’s command for Europe and Africa has sent Boeing’s Compact Laser Weapons System “to locations across the theater.” In late June, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth traveled to the Army’s test range in White Sands, New Mexico, for a demonstration of all sorts of directed-energy weapon projects.
Despite such mishaps, the Army appears ready to go beyond the one-offs and the experiments. In fact, in some ways, the accidental kill helped make the case for the laser, proving it could actually take out such a drone.
The Pentagon and its suppliers had been scrambling to field something, anything to defend against mass-produced, low-cost attack drones. They’ve rolled out radio frequency jammers, microwave weapons, an array of missiles, drones designed to kill other drones, even copies of the Iranian robots. None of them in isolation have been enough. On March 1, an Iranian drone killed six US service members and injured 30 others.
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