When TI executive Glenn E. Penisten attempted to sell the new technology to the United States Air Force (USAF), Colonel Joe Davis Jr. inquired if it could instead be used as a ground attack system to overcome problems US aircraft were having with the poor accuracy of bombing in Vietnam.

Davis had already witnessed a test of the United States Army's new laser target designator made by Martin Marietta, but no seeker existed to make use of the system.

Davis had already performed tests from the back seat of an F-4 Phantom II fighter bomber and proved that it was possible to accurately target objects from a moving aircraft.

Earlier electro-optical weapons such as the AGM-62 Walleye could accurately strike targets with small outlines and good contrast on camera but had difficulty hitting large oddly shaped structures like bridges.

[8][9][5] Another equally important improvement was the ability to use add-on guidance kits to turn standard "dumb" ordnance into precision-guided munition yielding a considerable increase in effectiveness compared with free-falling, unguided bombs, and doing so at a fraction of the cost of other guided weapons.