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Perceptics Corporation Wins Customs Service Contract

6 October 1998

Perceptics Corporation Wins Customs Service Contract For Automated Vehicle License Plate Recognition

    KNOXVILLE, Tenn., Oct. 5 -- Perceptics Corporation, a
subsidiary of Northrop Grumman Corporation , has been awarded a
contract worth up to $45 million from the U.S. Customs Service to provide
automated vehicle license plate recognition (LPR) systems.
    The multiyear contract is for the supply, installation and maintenance of
the equipment for use at the nation's northern and southern borders.  The
initial $13.9 million phase is for automating the southwestern border.
    Perceptics' LPR system is designed to automatically locate, read, process
and transmit license plate information on vehicles as they enter or leave
border checkpoints, enabling the real-time identification of stolen or
potentially high-risk vehicles by Customs Service officers during normal
traffic flow.
    License plate data is sent real-time from the border checkpoint to the
U.S. Treasury Enforcement Communications System (TECS) database in Washington,
D.C.  If a suspicious vehicle is identified, Customs Service officers can be
alerted in time to examine the vehicle, its cargo or its occupants.
    "With the Perceptics license plate reader, traffic at border crossings is
able to flow more efficiently as Customs Service officers are freed from the
tedious job of manually entering license plate numbers," said Bill Black,
president of Perceptics.  "This allows the officers to focus on detecting and
examining vehicles and occupants with high-risk profiles."
    Perceptics, based in Knoxville, is a world leader in license plate reader
systems with nearly 1,000 LPR systems installed and operating in the United
States and seven other countries, providing accurate and immediate license
plate monitoring in all weather conditions, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
    Perceptics LPRs are being used for land border crossings in the United
States, Canada and Southeast Asia, and for electronic tolling in Europe and
Australia.  The technology has also been applied to cargo container
recognition and management at marine terminals in the United States and Asia.
Other Perceptics products include machine vision inspection systems for
process and quality control in the food and pharmaceutical markets.
    Northrop Grumman Corporation, headquartered in Los Angeles, is a leading
designer, systems integrator and manufacturer of military surveillance and
combat aircraft, defense electronics and systems, airspace management systems,
information systems, marine systems, precision weapons, space systems and
commercial and military aerostructures.