These New Semi-Automatic Smart Rifles Can Track Targets at 1,500 Feet

Earlier this year, TrackingPoint Solutions announced that its precision-guided firearm, a long-range laser-guided rifle utilizing jet fighter lock-and-launch technology, would go semi-automatic. With this week's launch of its new series of combat assault rifles, TrackingPoint is now offering both small and long caliber models of the smart semi-autos.

They're kitted out with a lot of the hardware and software that we've come to expect of TrackingPoint's products: stabilized target selection, target tracking, guided trigger-firing, an optional "freefire" mode, wifi connection, and of course the company's proprietary networked tracking scope, which calculates the ballistics of your shots for you.

But unlike the company's flagship bolt-action PGF, these robo rifles are baked with image-recognition software, which corrects for lead if you're tracking a moving target. Perhaps notably, the ARs have target tracking ranges of 500 yards, and rangefinder capability of 750 yards. For a scoped AR, that's out there. Particularly for the hunting and sport-shooting sets, which TrackingPoint has always made overtures to.

You get some of that in the full AR series overview, seen above. But the reel seems to walk a fine line between hobby and war. Who is TrackingPoint really making a go for? I reached out to the company and asked.

"We do use a military scenario in the video, but our customers are still buying for hunting," Oren Schauble, head of marketing at TrackingPoint, told me. He added that the company is currently in contract talks with the government for just the bolt-action PGF. Talk of the new ARs have not come up in their conversations.

Either way, the ARs are the next step—yours for just under $10,000 a pop—toward the so-called networked battlefiled of data-driven soldiers, something TrackingPoint is actively working toward. The Austin-based applied tech startup (profiled in our doc, Long Shot) is even now integrating its technology with Google Glass, allowing for extreme-angle shooting and accuracy.

"Being able to shoot around corners and over hills is a little mind-blowing when you actually do it," added Schauble, who's shot with Glass. "Things keep on rolling."