Fraser,
How right you are about ULIS! We always were amazed at the almost seemingly nonchalant way ULIS treated exports of their FPAs (mind you, these were FPAs, not “cameras.”) Concurrently, the US authorities were in my view overly pedantic about exports especially with respect to allied countries such as those in NATO+. And the combination of these factors were a tremendous commercial benefit to ULIS as US competitors lost sales to European OEMs and integrators solely due to the divergence in export policies.
France is a member of Wassenaar and all members are supposed to read from the same sheet of music. But seemingly not so, in reality. Take for instance exports to China. The French export policy (Their MoD who controlled export of FPAs on the French end) allowed the export of FPAs to China at a time when NOBODY else was allowed to do that. It was difficult enough for my company, and FLIR, FLUKE, Bullard, e2v, etc., to obtain a license to China for a commercial firefighting or PPM camera. An FPA? Forget about it.
Second point, and related to the ULIS export practices: the very first FPAs that were developed in China were a:Si. In fact, they looked exactly like a ULIS, including packaging and pinout. Engineers tell me they were very similar electrically. That said, the Chinese failed to get some not so obvious things right when they copied it and that resulted in a noisy detector. And because the core development expertise wasn’t there, there was a bit of “scratch head” going on their end and those issues were never really resolved. And, as you probably know, the early ULIS FPAs (45u variants) were pretty noisy themselves, so in comparison you can imagine just how noisy the Chinese ones were. Early Dali, Guide and SAT cameras were among ones who either tried to use, or used those Chinese FPAs in products.
Side note: the very first thermal imaging in China was pyroelectric vidicon. They obtained tubes from Thompson in France (again) as a basis. China variant was pretty much unusable though. There were only three worldwide sources of PEV tubes; Thompson, EEV, and some bird in Russia named Tatiana. And I don’t think EEV would sell them any tubes.
Back to a:Si: I imagine with reasonable confidence that the availability of products and technical data from ULIS was a jumpstart for the Chinese and as such they started with a:Si. VOx came later, I suppose it took longer for them to obtain the technical data because it was more tightly controlled as VOx was exclusively American at the time.
All that said, today, China has come a long way. Their products look much better than before. Companies like IRay, HIKVision, Wuhan Guide, SAT, etc. have very nice commercial offerings albeit they still have some catching-up to do. The Chinese don’t have the most advanced stuff. I suppose though eventually they will get their hands on it but by then we will have moved on. I think that in order for them to supersede the west technologically, the mindset and culture will need to change. I don’t think that will happen any time soon. The practices (and mindset) are too engrained. The old saying “you don’t know what you don’t know” applies as well.
A pilot with 200 flight hours is now confident in his abilities. This is when accidents happen. An airline pilot with 10,000 flight hours doesn’t make many mistakes.
Lastly regarding ITAR vs EAR cameras, the rule of thumb we used to use is that dual use is anything that is a commercial use not “specifically designed” for military. However, that doesn’t always hold true. Gun sights are always ITAR, even if the product is low rez and targets the hunting market. In addition, certain products that were originally assigned CCL 6a003 (camera) could be issued a CJ (change of jurisdiction) and become ITAR restricted. US DoD (or UK MoD) can do that pretty much at will. The authorities have a lot of eyes looking and if your stuff is found in the wrong hands and/or being used not as agreed in the export docs, you may be issued a CJ. This is not the only way to get a CJ but it’s one of the ways. To avoid problems, suggest anyone wishing to export contact the export authorities and they will know. Lastly, technical documentation and supporting software are controlled as well. For instance, software used in production for calibration, etc.
So, we had two engineering centers; one in England and one in the US. We had to have firewalls between the two centers (centres.) We had to obtain licenses to export hardware, software, ICDs, etc. to our own people in England and visa versa, the Brits had to do the same. This business is not for those who lack discipline and attention to detail.
Hope this was fun and entertaining.
Dalittle
Home
Help
Search
Login
Register
