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The assessment and judging activity will take place in the Thales Pavilion at the Farnborough International Airshow, where around 60 school children aged between 12 and 14 from Amersham School in Buckinghamshire, Chilton Trinity Technology College in Bridgwater in Somerset and Woking High School in Surrey will present their solutions and get a chance to experience the excitement of the flying display from the best view at the Airshow. 

The Schools Challenge initiative is a part of Thales' ongoing commitment to encouraging schoolchildren and students into science and engineering careers, and focuses around the teams designing unmanned ground vehicles and addressing the issues of visual signature management (camouflage!) 

The entries will be judged by Ajay Sharman, Regional Director for STEMNET, the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Network, and Sir Michael Graydon, Chairman of the Thales UK Charitable Trust and former head of the UK Air Force.  Sir Michael will present the winning team with trophies and a cheque for £1,000 to be split between the school and the team. 

The MoD Grand Challenge sets a huge task to create a system with a high degree of autonomy that can correctly, identify, monitor and report a comprehensive range of military threats in an urban environment.  "The Thales Team", known as T3, comprises a broad mix of talents and capabilities from Thales, Bristol and Reading Universities, Ryland Research and Carvec.  The Grand Finale will take place in August. 

About Thales and Thales UK

Thales is a leading international electronics and systems group, addressing defence, aerospace and security markets worldwide. Thales' leading-edge technology is supported by 22,000 R&D engineers who offer a capability unmatched in Europe to develop and deploy field-proven mission-critical information systems. To this end, the group's civil and military businesses develop in parallel and share a common base of technologies to serve a single objective: the security of people, property and nations. The group builds its growth on its unique multi-domestic strategy based on trusted partnerships with national customers and market players, while leveraging its global expertise to support local technology and industrial development. Thales employs 68,000 people in 50 countries with 2007 revenues in excess of £8.3bn.

Thales UK employs 9,000 staff based at more than 50 locations. In 2007 Thales UK's revenues were over £1.2bn.

Press contact:

Thales UK
Kathryn Bell
Mob: +44 7813 903274

http://www.thalesgroup.com/