Raytheon Company unveiled its BattleGuard modular weapon system at the U.S. Army 2012 Maneuver Conference. BattleGuard is an integrated Electro-Optical Infrared and visible sensor with a weapon station that accurately identifies targets beyond the maximum effective range of weapons systems – more than twice that of competing technologies.

"BattleGuard is an affordable, low-risk solution for combat vehicles that enhances the commander's mission capability," said Glynn Raymer, vice president of Combat and Sensing Systems in Raytheon's Network Centric Systems business.

"The significance to the commander is the plug-and-play nature of the system. It is easy and fast to change configuration, to take off and put on another device, providing additional and immediate vehicle and squad protection," he added.

Designed for tracked and wheeled combat vehicles, BattleGuard provides trained operators with 360 degrees of "under armor" unobstructed coverage. It also offers a high performance 2nd or 3rd generation FLIR (Forward Looking Infrared) – a threat detection system that enables classification, recognition and identification of stationary and moving targets beyond the maximum effective ranges of threat weapons.

The system supports a number of machine and chain guns, including the M249, M240, M2, MK-19, MK-47, M134 and the M230LF. It also supports hard- or soft-launch missiles such as the Griffin, Javelin, Stinger and TOW, and non-lethal weapons.