DARPA has awarded a 30-month, $18.5 million contract to BAE Systems of Lexington, Mass. The company, which specializes in aerospace and global defense products, will lead the agency’s Autonomous Real-Time Ground Ubiquitous Surveillance Imaging System program. Its goal is to develop, integrate and demonstrate new intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance systems and abilities, including an airborne processing system that will continuously and simultaneously detect and track thousands of large or small targets over an area covering tens of square miles.