A US-based producer of high-end computing and industrial products that provides Mobile Video Surveillance Systems (MVSS) for monitoring the US-Mexico border.
Benchmark Electronics is a manufacturing, engineering, and information technology (IT) company headquartered in Tempe, Arizona, which serves the military, aerospace, medical, telecommunications, and computing industries. It generated $2.1 billion in 2020 and operates facilities in the U.S., Brazil, China, Ireland, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, Romania, Singapore, and Thailand.
Electronics has manufactured Mobile Video Surveillance Systems (MVSS) for CBP through its Tactical Micro subsidiary. As of July 2021, Tactical Micro had been awarded $73.8 million to provide CBP with MVSS, accounting for more than half of all revenue derived from the company’s sales to the U.S. government.
Since 2015, Benchmark’s subsidiary Tactical Micro has been providing U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) with Mobile Video Surveillance Systems (MVSS) for monitoring the U.S.-Mexico border. MVSS consists of “day and night camera systems fitted on telescopic poles mounted on Border Patrol 4x4 vehicles.” At least some, if not all, of the systems are installed on Ford F-150 pickup trucks.
CBP awarded Tactical Micro the MVSS contract in October 2015, the same week that Benchmark Electronics announced it would acquire Tactical Micro’s parent company, Secure Communication Systems Inc. The acquisition was finalized a month later. The MVSS contract is worth a potential $73.8 million and expired in October 2021. As of February 2020, CBP had 58 MVSS units deployed along the U.S.-Mexico border.
MVSS are intended to “augment fixed surveillance systems that have line-of-sight coverage gaps caused by existing infrastructure, terrain, or vegetation.” It is a component of CBP’s Border Surveillance Systems (BSS), which includes Elbit Systems Integrated Fixed Towers (IFT), General Dynamics Remote Video Surveillance System (RVSS), drones, and underground sensors.
In a FY2021 budget document, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stated that it was planning to deploy an additional 165 MVSS along the U.S.-Mexico border. DHS is planning to expand MVSS capabilities with the Modular Mobile Surveillance System (M2S2), which will add radar capabilities to MVSS cameras and be used to target and detect moving objects in low-visibility conditions.