February 25, 2007 -- Here's the problem. You've got a sensitive installation which could be a prime target for a terrorist attack - someplace like an airport, a border, a water installation. You've got the funds to secure the site. But what you don't have is the knowledge about where to put the sensors and the lights for maximum effectiveness, how to best secure that blind spot, and how not to destroy the acreage of natural landscape surrounding the installation.
Enter Lighthouse, an Israeli-developed CAD (computer-aided design) program that enables the automation of perimeter security planning including sensor arrays, obstacles, and other measures used to provide buffer zone protection for highways, airports, borders, military facilities and other strategic infrastructure sites.
Lighthouse is the showcase product of DefenSoft, a four-year-old company based in Yokneam, near Haifa. According to the company's chief operating officer Ittai Bar Joseph, concerns about terror threats and crime have made buffer zone protection at borders and strategic infrastructure sites a global priority. And security planners and infrastructure designers involved in planning defense arrays that incorporate both physical infrastructures and advanced sensor technology, now play a key role in enhancing homeland security.
"With Lighthouse, security planners and decision makers can plan defense arrays themselves, taking into account all the constraints and issues - budgetary, engineering, and environmental," he told.
Using digital terrain models, aerial and satellite imagery, GIS technology, sensor specifications, engineering and environmental data, Lighthouse creates a highly accurate 3D interactive representation of the defense array. The Lighthouse helps users analyze the terrain, identify weak spots, define physical obstacles, propose location of obstacles, and analyze technological obstacles.
The company's track record in Israel is so attractive that American private equity group Athlone Global Security, Inc., (AGS) has acquired a minority 15% interest in the company.
"DefenSoft's technology makes it possible for civil engineers to use maps to decide precisely where to position cameras or other sensor devices to make government installations as well as public airports, railroads and other critical infrastructure secure. This planning tool saves engineers from having to visit the site in person, and speeds the process of design and installation of security equipment for sensitive structures," said Gordon Hawke, president and CEO of AGS.
According to Bar Joseph, the involvement of AGS will enable DefenSoft to expand to the American market.
"The funding we've received from AGS will be used to introduce the Lighthouse to American homeland security industry," he said.
"As we talk, we're opening a US subsidiary, to be run by a local US staff. We've been to trade shows and demonstrated the Lighthouse to various potential customers, and the overwhelmingly positive response is the reason why we're opening the US office.
The Lighthouse gives a full scale solution to a big market - to many diverse customers who don't have a specific solution to their problem."
With the R&D backing of the Office of the Chief Scientist in Israel, in less than a year the company had started generating revenue, and within a year and a half, they had signed their first contracts with the IDF and the Defense Ministry.
"That's pretty spectacular for a young company," he said.
Today, with 20 employees and a fledgling operation in the US, DefenSoft is beginning to realize its potential. But Bar Joseph says there are no plans to rest on their laurels.
"Our current focus is still on the Lighthouse, and we're developing quite a few new applications and features for it. But at the same time, we're rapidly developing future systems."
--David Brinn--
