“It’s not just body armor; it’s all the things that go into that,” Special Operations Command acquisition executive James Geurts said in a statement. “This includes sensors, heads-up displays, an exoskeleton to reduce the load special operators carry, medical sensors, and much, much more.”
The TALOS program began 18 months ago with the development of this exoskeleton, allowing the wearer to move heavy gear that would feature an internal computing system, the statement read. The advantages of this Special Operations Command (SOCOM) technology, according to the statement, are nimbleness, agility, and adaptability.
TALOS’ effort has a small join acquisition task force, concentrating on the suit’s invention, Geurts said. The process has been opened up to many different companies, government agencies and entities, and academia, who are participating in the creation of this suit, he added.
The beginnings of this suit’s creation to the “rapid prototyping event” SOCOM held last year that strengthened their network that has been growing around the suit, whose development began then around 18 months ago, Guerts said.
The main focus has been closing the distance between operator, acquirer, and technologist, Guerts said.
As a result of the research SOCOM has done, SOCOM have spun off 12 or 14 other inventions since they began work on the suit. The end-product with a fully-functional suit remains the goal, according to DOD.
