AMSAR

The Airborne Multirole Solid State Active Array Radar (AMSAR), is an Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA).

The project is a European collaborative project and is under development by the British/French/German GTDAR consortium. This organisation, originally (GEC-Thomson-DASA Airborne Radar) is now made up of their successor companies, BAE Systems (now SELEX), Thales, and EADS, respectively.

The AMSAR project began in 1993 in a 50/50 Anglo-French programme with German technical participation.

The radar is envisaged as a replacement for;
 * Typhoon's CAPTOR radar
 * Rafale's RBE2 passive electronically scanned array

It is possible the radar will be ready for the Tranche 3 Typhoons (around 2010) or, failing that, may be incorporated in a future mid life update (MLU).