Inmarsat Government Unveils LAISR Ultra-lightweight User Terminal for Government Airborne ISR Missions

Inmarsat Government, the leading provider of secure, global, mission-critical telecommunications to the U.S. Government, today announced the availability of its next-generation L-band Airborne Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Ultra-Lightweight (LAISR ULW) user terminal.

The terminal, which consists of a core module and antenna, is the latest addition to the company’s award-winning LAISR family of L-band terminals. ULW delivers access to high availability, high performance, full duplex, secure beyond line-of-sight (BLOS) communications via the Inmarsat global ELERA L-band network.

LAISR ULW provides customers with high data rate throughput to support BLOS communications, while further reducing the total terminal SWaP.  Featuring an integrated antenna self-steering capability, ULW does not require external navigation data from the host platform and can operate in GPS-denied environments.

LAISR ULW is enabled by Inmarsat Government’s Black ICE Medium Software Defined Radio (SDR), which implements the powerful and highly efficient Digital Video Broadcasting Satellite Second Generation (DVB-S2X) waveform in a low-SWaP form factor. It also includes an advanced Radio Frequency Front End (RFFE), which provides robust filtering capabilities including automatic terrestrial interference protection. LAISR ULW also leverages Inmarsat Government’s multiprotocol label switching (MPLS) terrestrial backbone to transport customer traffic from the platform to its destination securely.

Customers can select from multiple antenna options, enabling them to tailor the terminal to meet their unique requirements. Antenna options range from compact omnidirectional patch antennas to fuselage-mounted, high-gain, steered variants. The terminal can be implemented in a stand-alone configuration or retrofitted into an existing Inmarsat-enabled aircraft.

Matt Wissler, Chief Technology Officer, Inmarsat Government, said “Beyond line-of-sight communications are a critical component of U.S. Government’s AISR operations, and our customers need a secure, reliable and flexible solution to transmit information. With LAISR ULW, we provide our users with another compact and customer-focused innovation that supports their aero communications requirements for a globally portable, low-SWAP, flexible high-speed solution.

“We built these solutions tailored specifically to meet our government customers’ mission-critical needs. The ULW terminal reflects upon their critical requirements for SATCOM-enabled BLOS connectivity and provides small UAS platforms (Group 2+) with a globally portable communications solution that provides high-rate return and maintains platform range to support ISR missions worldwide.”.