Proven track record of SmartIR640P uncooled thermal core, perfect fit for night & day vision of handheld equipment

Grenoble, France – 10 January 2022 (for immediate release)

After Photonis and Device ALab joined forces, Photonis is proud to announce the successful delivery of the 1000th unit of the SmartIR640P, the great reference core ready-to-integrate & use for night & day vision of handheld equipment. This camera core is part of the growing LWIR camera families which use proprietary shutterless technology and contributes to complete the product portfolio of Photonis Digital Vision.

Reduced technical risks and time-to-market

De facto, with SmartIR640P, the equipment maker can rely on a MIL-STD-810G and TWS duly qualified camera core, and focus on completing its integration with optics, batteries, and user features with short time to market. A quicker and smoother integration, relying on proven performance as image quality, required consumption, fast time to first image, lightweight, mechanical resistance… to finally have the ergonomic product of his choice, easily customizable to serve various end-user applications. Indeed, SmartIR640P can end-up in various implementations: mostly thermal weapon sight and thermal clip-on, night & day monocular, but also helmet mounted devices and portable devices (e.g. multiple wavelength and/or telemetry)

Europe-made product, 1000 units already delivered

SmartIR640P is designed and manufactured in France, which by far simplifies the export procedure all across EU countries. The product is already in use in several programs, DGA/FPSA for French Armed Forces being the most emblematic one. SmartIR640P is indeed a key component in the lightweight TIGRIS-IR clip-on of the contractor: OIP Sensor Systems (BE). DRI performance for a 2.3m x 2.3m NATO target are: 5.8 km (Detection), 2 km (Recognition) and 1 km (Identification). The autonomy exceeds 8 hours with Lithium batteries.

All starts with an engine SmartIR640E

This so-called platform is derived from the SmartIR640E engine core, and as such benefits of existing Device-ALab’s proprietary technologies: shutterless, local Automated Gain Contrast, Progressive Digital Zoom and Overlays to name a few. The shutterless enables to operate the device on a wide operating temperature range [-40°C to +70°C], keeping non-uniformity at low & acceptable level. However, in extreme cases, it remains anyway possible for the user to generate another one-point-NUC on site if ever required. The local AGC offers capability to observe low contrast details in a scene with significantly different dynamics, while the progressive digital zoom offers total control to fit the image to the display or to the chosen area of interest in the scene. Overlays stack provide latitude for the designer to upload reticles, symbols and text overlays linked to his own user application. In future there will be more to come!

Versatility and scalability of Platforms

SmartIR640P features a so-called “display control board”, which turns the engine core into a platform, to handle three functions: battery power management, video formats compatible to existing OLED displays and the user interface (via a microcontroller firmware the designer can re-write and customize). Should the designer of the optronic equipment want to skip one of the functions above listed, it is possible to disable them. Totally at Device-ALab clients’ discretion, SmartIR640P can be supplied in base configuration or with display stack. Alternatively, can also be supplied with an additional video analog PAL/NTSC, to cover all sort of operational
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needs. Beyond the sole SmartIR640P (which features 640 17μm LWIR sensors) are to come alternative models: LWIR (320 12μm, 640 12μm) as well as SWIR (640 15μm), which will be easily swappable with minimal redesign of the final equipment. Stay tune!