 In 1999, the US Army bought four AeroVironment Pointer small UAVs for testing in the service's "Military Operations In Urban Terrain" and was enthusiastic about the usefulness of the Pointer.It is too large to be conveniently carried by soldiers and is normally hauled around in a HMMWV(Humvee) vehicle or the like, and so the Army asked AeroVironment to develop a smaller version.AeroVironment developed a half-sized control system and a cut-down version of the Pointer called the RQ-11 Raven (no relationship to the Flight Refueling Raven).