Sponsored by The British Robotics Seed Fund
http: www.britbots.com/fund
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22 Jul 21. £195m contract signed for 13 additional RAF Protectors. A £195m contract for a further 13 cutting-edge Protector aircraft has been signed. Defence Minister Jeremy Quin announced the new contract during a visit to GKN Aerospace (GKNA), who are manufacturing key parts of aircraft on the Isle of Wight. Protector is a Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) that will provide critical surveillance capability for the RAF and will be equipped with a suite of surveillance equipment and precision strike weapons to deploy against potential adversaries around the globe, all while being operated from RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire.
16 aircraft have now been ordered from General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc (GA-ASI) and are expected to enter service with the RAF by mid-2024, doubling the capability currently provided by Reaper. The investment also includes four additional ground control stations and associated support equipment.
At GKNA’s Cowes site, Minister Quin saw first-hand how the programme benefits UK industry as they manufacture the V-tails for Protector and other SkyGuardian variants for customers across the world, including Belgium and Australia, following their partnership with GA-ASI.
Defence Minister Jeremy Quin said, “Our fleet of sixteen Protector aircraft equipped with ultra-modern technology will provide the RAF with a vast global reach allowing us to monitor and protect the battlespace for hours on end. The Protector programme involves industry across the UK with vital parts of the aircraft manufactured on the Isle of Wight, supporting highly-skilled jobs for years to come.”
The commitment to a 16-strong Protector fleet was outlined in the Defence Command Paper and is supported by the £24bn uplift to the defence budget over the next four years.
With 12 UK industry partners, the programme is bringing together world-leading technology and service providers to work with GA-ASI, supporting over 200 UK jobs with £400m being reinvested into UK industry.
Protector will be deployed in wide-ranging Intelligence, Surveillance, Targeting and Reconnaissance (ISTAR) operations where its ability to fly consistently for up to 40 hours offers the RAF vastly improved armed ISTAR capability.
Protector Programme Senior Responsible Owner, Air Commodore Richard Barrow said, “The contract for the additional 13 Protector aircraft, taking the total to 16, is a major milestone for the UK. When Protector enters service in 2024, UK Defence will take an enormous jump forward in capability, giving us the ability to operate globally with this cutting-edge, highly-adaptable platform.
The first three aircraft were ordered last year, with the first two completed and currently undergoing test and evaluation in the US. The first aircraft delivery to the RAF will be in 2023.”
CEO of Defence Equipment and Support, Sir Simon Bollom said, “I am delighted the purchase of a further 13 Protector aircraft has been confirmed enabling us to ensure the RAF will have the increased capability needed to operate effectively in the modern battlespace.”
Later this year, Protector’s capability will be demonstrated in the UK. A SkyGuardian aircraft will take to the skies in Lincolnshire before taking part in Exercise Joint Warrior from RAF Lossiemouth.
Protector will have to meet stringent NATO and UK safety certification standards meaning it could operate in civilian airspace. It therefore will also be available, if requested, to support civilian agencies in the UK, for example in search and rescue and disaster response missions.
The fleet will also have advanced anti-icing and lightning protection, providing the RAF with unprecedented flexibility to operate in adverse weather conditions.
The aircraft will use enhanced data links and carry next-generation, low collateral, precision strike weapons – the UK-made Brimstone missile and Paveway IV Laser Guided Bomb. (Source: https://www.gov.uk/)
17 Aug 21. TEKEVER and Aerovel partner to integrate Flexrotor into TEKEVER UAS product line. Flexrotor for missions requiring vertical takeoff-and-landing with transitions to and from horizontal altitude flights. It has unprecedented range and endurance for an aircraft of its size. The Aerovel Flexrotor will be the newest member of TEKEVER’s UAS product line (the global leader in UAS-based maritime surveillance). The European based UAS manufacturer and operator TEKEVER and the North American Aerovel signed a partnership to integrate this fully tested and best-in-class VTOL solution into TEKEVER UAS family. The Flexrotor combines a small footprint with long endurance (more that 30 hours) and outsized capacity, enabling shipboard operations. The system will join TEKEVER’s real-time intelligence service, powered by a cross-platform Ground Control Station and an AI/ML-powered Intelligence Distribution platform, assuring the right person gets the right information at the right moment.
“We are pleased to partner with TEKEVER, an exceptional provider of actionable intelligence for security entities, including the United Kingdom’s Home Office, and the European Space and Maritime Safety Agencies. Our combined capabilities bring to bear powerful information for decision-makers,” said Ali Dian, CEO of Aerovel.
“The Flexrotor has by far the longest endurance among Vertical Takeoff and Landing aircraft of any size, having flown 32 hr nonstop with hours of fuel to spare. The investment made by Aerovel, during more than a decade, has created the best-in-class VTOL in the market, tested
and successfully deployed in civilian and military operations, land and sea, amounting to thousands of flight hours. It’s a great complement our fully integrated and inter-operable product line, widening the range of missions we can support our partners and clients with.”, added Ricardo Mendes, CEO of TEKEVER.
25 Aug 21. V-150 Platform Flies BVLOS For First Time as Part of ECARO Trials. At this year’s DSEI event in London, Europe’s leading provider of Rotary UAS platforms, UMS SKELDAR, will be discussing how its V-150 platform is the first UAS platform in its category to fly beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) in Europe as part of the ECARO trials.
ECARO is a multidisciplinary project whose main objective is the adoption of European satellite navigation systems GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite Systems), EGNOS and Galileo for all civil aviation applications such as fixed wing operations, UAVs and rotorcraft emergency operations. Integrating GNSS into UAV flight is a key requirement for adopting UAS into controlled airspace.
UMS Skeldar participated in three weeks of trials at Grottaglie Airport in Italy, deploying a crew, remote pilot station and the V-150 platform. The flight profile followed the satellite approach procedure designed by ENAV in accordance with new EASA regulations. A complete success, the trials demonstrated how a robust UAS platform like the V-150 can be integrated into the manned aviation airspace.
Another milestone in the V-150’s story, David Willems (VP Business Development & Strategy) and Richard Hjelmberg (VP Campaigns) will be at DSEI to discuss the ECARO project in more detail, alongside the developments planned for the UMS Skeldar platform portfolio over the rest of the year. If you would like to organise a media briefing with David and Richard for Tuesday 14th or Wednesday 15th September, please contact to arrange a time.
11 Aug 21. Flare Bright wins UK MOD Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) follow-up contract. Following a successful initial DASA contract to prove the concept of true autonomy in drones, Flare Bright have been awarded a larger follow-up contract to provide the same autonomy in powered drones to give increase persistence and endurance. This project will deliver a fixed wing drone that can fly without GPS or any remote-control, when other drones are unflyable due to jamming and denial.
Flare Bright’s latest £425,391 contract lasts for 13 months and recently commenced, and follows on from the completion of an initial £226,500 contract that successfully concluded in April 2021. It will be announced at DSEI, to coincide with Flare Bright being selected to showcase its success at DASA’s stand (stand H2-110 ) and representatives will be talking through the innovative technology that creates this GPS-free technology throughout the show.
The military is increasingly using drones. GPS will often be denied and spoofed, and electromagnetic communication used for remote control will be jammed. Drones typically have an unsophisticated approach to dealing with jamming, outages or failure. Flare Bright has developed the technology to develop a truly autonomous drone that doesn’t rely on any of these methods and uses un-jammable internal means of flight control and navigation.
Flare Bright’s existing autonomous gliding drone has proven this and has now been selected by the US Army Expeditionary Warrior Experiment and has been promoted on the UK Government’s website as a Case Study.
Flare Bright aims to extend its proven autonomous flight system’s persistence to perform a mission for 5-10 minutes without GPS or any other communications in a fixed-wing powered drone.
Any military would like to develop a truly autonomous drone that doesn’t rely on GPS or remote control and just uses unjammable internal means of flight control and navigation. As DASA itself states, “The UK Defence and Security sector has demanding requirements for accurate and resilient Position, Navigation and Timing (PNT). When Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) are either absent, denied, degraded or unreliable, a platform’s Inertial Navigation System (INS) will drift; PNT uncertainty will grow, and mission success may be compromised. As the future operational environment becomes increasingly congested, cluttered, contested, connected and constrained, advances in current navigation technologies will be required to avoid mission failure.” This project will achieve the next level of practical development in this area.
John Binns, the recently retired Deputy Director of Strategy for the MOD Test and Evaluation team stated, “From my engagement with FlareBright, following a TechUK Defence Test and Evaluation conference, I have been increasingly impressed by their innovative methods by which they use machine learning and AI coupled with synthetic environments to rapidly test and prototype their autonomous SnapShot system validated by short duration live trial data.
I believe the innovation shown by FlareBright in their testing and prototyping has the potential to provide Defence with the ability to accelerate the development of unmanned and autonomous systems and have supported your efforts by providing opportunities to present their innovative technique to FLC’s at the Test & Evaluation Futures Programme Board.”
Former Paratrooper and Flare Bright’s Chief Commercial Officer, Chris Daniels said, “Every soldier knows that instant, tactical aerial surveillance is vital on any operation. To provide this to front line soldiers in a super lightweight form, with no training needed, and that can work in any challenging environment has to be good news for soldier survivability. We’re delighted we’re helping out.”
More info on Flare Bright
Flare Bright is a rapidly growing aerospace company pushing the boundaries of embedded AI technology to develop autonomous drones. Flare Bright specialises in its UAS product: SnapShot, designed to be the lightest and simplest way to get aerial images at the single press of a button.
Flare Bright has three core products:
- The MOD’s Defence and Security Accelerator is funding the ruggedisation of SnapShot for the defence and security market.
- SnapShot is being developed to measure winds accurately at altitudes up to 100m. This is part of a wider InnovateUK project to create live wind maps of urban, industrial and other difficult environments.
- It is developing a precision air-dropped drone for delivering small items such as medicines, vaccines or critical parts to remote places cheaply and efficiently.
Flare Bright is increasing the endurance, controllability and capability of small drones, and will be introducing thermal imagery into its range soon.
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The British Robotics Seed Fund is the first SEIS-qualifying investment fund specialising in UK-based robotics businesses. The focus of the fund is to deliver superior returns to investors by making targeted investments in a mixed basket of the most innovative and disruptive businesses that are exploiting the new generation of robotics technologies in defence and other sector applications.
Automation and robotisation are beginning to drive significant productivity improvements in the global economy heralding a new industrial revolution. The fund allows investors to benefit from this exciting opportunity, whilst also delivering the extremely attractive tax reliefs offered by the Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS). For many private investors, the amount of specialist knowledge required to assess investments in robotics is not practical and hence investing through a fund structure makes good sense.
The fund appoints expert mentors to work with each investee company to further maximise the chance of success for investors. Further details are available on request.
www.britbots.com/fund
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