Thales profile

Thales designs, develops and implements advanced electronic solutions, which meet the communications, information and security needs of people in countries throughout the world. Its activities cover three major markets: Information Technology and Services, Aerospace and Defence. The Thales group has operations in more than 30 countries and totals 65,000 employees world wide.

Thales Research and Technology (UK) Limited (TRT (UK)) is the UK arm of the Thales corporate research centre, We have a long history of producing successful innovative solutions for which we have been awarded four Queen's Awards for Technology.

Fundamental to this success is our ability to respond to requests and changing requirements at all levels in the process of taking an idea from an initial concept to a final product. Naturally, this includes a full understanding of the mathematics that underlies the design of a product, from its mechanical structure to the processing performed by the software. Mathematicians thus play a major role in our day to day business, designing the algorithms and software to ensure that our products perform reliably and to specification.

Our current research and development activities are focused on the following four main application areas:

• Homeland Security concerns all aspects of public safety, including deterrence, prediction, crisis management and recovery. A particular activity is the design of mathematical algorithms to process the signals from a suite of sensors carried by ISO standard containers, which carry goods around the world by land and sea. Our objective is to provide a continuous remote check on their whereabouts, and validity of the mode of transport.



• Communications Security ensures that transmitted information reaches its destination in an uncorrupted, secure and timely manner. Using mathematical algorithms from coding theory and cryptography, the information is coded in such a way that transmission errors are detected and corrected, and encrypted so that an eavesdropper is unable to understand the content. Mathematical algorithms define the required digital signal processing, and statistical management techniques measure the network quality of service achieved.



• Precise Positioning and Navigation (e.g. GPS and Galileo) provides a user with accurate knowledge of location, based on signals received from radio transmitters and/or satellites. The signals are first processed to provide time and range information, from which mathematical algorithms then deduce the location. As a bonus, the system also provides a mechanism for distributing precise time information around the globe.



• The Virtual-Collaboration Solutions project is aimed at providing a means for partners to work together effectively from geographically remote locations. This requires mathematical algorithms to integrate audio and visual communications, allowing users to view and edit a shared workspace simultaneously, and to work together on common documents.