BAE Systems Selects Actel Axcelerator FPGAs For Archerfish Naval Mine Disposal System
Antifuse-Based FPGAs Provide Secure Solution for Safety and Arming
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MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., November 01, 2004 —
Actel Corporation (Nasdaq:
ACTL) today announced that its Axcelerator field-programmable gate arrays
(FPGAs) have been selected by BAE Systems as part of BAE Systems' Archerfish
naval mine disposal system. BAE Systems, an international company engaged
in the development, delivery and support of advanced defense and aerospace
systems in the air, on land, at sea and in space, will use the antifuse-based
AX250 device as a tamper-proof, radiation-resistant solution within the
safety and arming system of the Archerfish naval system.
"We needed a highly reliable programmable logic device that could
be used in the fusing subsystem of Archerfish," said Doug Green,
senior design engineer at BAE Systems. "For obvious reasons this
is a safety-critical application. Actel's devices offered us a nonvolatile,
one-time-programmable solution at a significantly lower cost than the
ASIC alternative. In addition, we wanted the flexibility offered by an
FPGA and wanted to eliminate the lengthy fabrication delays associated
with ASICs."
The Archerfish system is designed to be deployed from helicopter or
ship. The launch platform lowers a pod, which releases a small and highly
maneuverable, one-shot mine disposal vehicle containing a warhead. The
vehicle is guided via sonar and remote camera to seek out all types of
sea mines. When a mine is located, the weapon is detonated, safely destroying
the mine.
The Axcelerator AX250 device is used in the serial communications link
between the pod and the weapon itself, which is carried over a fiber
optic cable. As part of the final portion of the firing chain, it is
vital that these communications are carried out safely and securely.
Saloni Howard-Sarin, director of antifuse and tools marketing at Actel,
said, "Our antifuse devices deliver flexibility and fast turnaround,
while providing a tamper-proof and radiation-tolerant solution that is
often required by security and defense applications. This design win
with BAE Systems for the Archerfish is further evidence of Actel's position
as a leading provider of FPGA solutions for mission-critical applications."
About the Axcelerator Device Family
Built upon the company's AX architecture, the antifuse-based Axcelerator
family delivers better than 500 MHz internal operation and up to 100
percent resource utilization. Additionally, the company's live at power-up,
single-chip Axcelerator FPGAs avoid in-rush current spikes, simplify
system power supply design and generally offer lower standby and dynamic
power consumption than competing solutions. The devices offer levels
of design security beyond SRAM-based offerings and conventional ASIC
solutions, enabling designers to safeguard against common security problems,
including overbuilding, cloning, reverse engineering and denial of service.
Firm errors, which occur when high-energy neutrons generated in the upper
atmosphere strike the configuration cells of SRAM-based FPGAs, can be
impossible to prevent. Because the antifuse configuration cannot be altered
once programmed, firm errors in Axcelerator FPGAs are nonexistent.
About Actel
Actel Corporation is a supplier
of innovative programmable logic solutions, including field-programmable
gate arrays (FPGAs) based on antifuse and flash technologies, high-performance
intellectual property (IP) cores, software development tools, and design
services, targeted for the high-speed communications, application-
specific integrated circuit (ASIC) replacement and radiation-tolerant
markets. Founded in 1985, Actel employs more than 500 people worldwide.
The Company is traded on the Nasdaq National Market under the symbol
ACTL and is headquartered at 2061 Stierlin Court, Mountain View, CA,
94043-4655. Telephone: 888-99-ACTEL (992-2835). Internet: http://www.actel.com.
Contact: Stephanie Mrus, Actel Corporation, 650.318.4614
