From Flight Testing to Embedded Integration Across 3 Boeing organizations

One of the earliest projects came from Boeing Defence Australia, where GigaBlox Rugged was used as part of a flight-test network. The switch connected two onboard devices, a radio modem acting as the communications gateway, and a ground Ethernet connection. During testing, multicast UDP traffic flowed between the onboard systems while remaining accessible through both the downlink and the ground interface.

At Aurora Flight Sciences, the challenge was different. Rather than installing a complete Ethernet switch inside the aircraft, the team integrated GigaStax directly onto a custom carrier PCB for a small unmanned aircraft system. Because the implementation was export-controlled, Aurora couldn't share details about the platform itself, but they did explain why they chose GigaStax: integrating the switch directly onto the carrier board simplified packaging and reduced the amount of standalone networking hardware inside the aircraft.

Insitu Pacific took a similar embedded approach, using GigaBlox Rugged to network the electronics within a prototype airborne payload's onboard computer assembly.

Although the aircraft and payloads were different, the design priorities stayed consistent. The networking hardware needed to be compact, lightweight, and easy to integrate into the rest of the system. And that's exactly the kind of problem BotBlox was built to solve.