The U.S. Defense Innovation Unit announced that it is awarding contracts to four companies to develop prototypes of long-range, disposable drones that can launch quickly, carry a variety of payloads, and operate in low-throughput environments. Two of them are unnamed Ukrainian companies.
The U.S. Defense Innovation Unit announced that it is awarding contracts to four companies to develop prototypes of long-range, disposable drones that can launch quickly, carry a variety of payloads, and operate in low-throughput environments. Two of them are unnamed Ukrainian companies.
They will compete with American companies Dragoon and AeroVironment. Each of the Ukrainian manufacturers is cooperating with an American software development company, one of them with Swan, and the other with Auterion. This is reported by Defense News.
All four companies will conduct test demonstrations of their capabilities in April and May, and DIU will make its choice shortly thereafter.
The Artemis program was initiated by Congress last year at the request of operators of the U.S. European and Indo-Pacific Commands, which need low-cost, expendable drones, as well as countermeasures against drones. As part of a supplemental spending package for Ukraine, lawmakers allocated about $35 million to the U.S. Department of Defense and tasked it with identifying and testing low-cost unmanned systems that can navigate and communicate despite electronic warfare and spoofing.
The goal was to move quickly and prove that these systems could be ready for using much faster than a traditional multi-year defense procurement program. According to Trent Emeneker, head of the Pentagon’s acquisition and sustainment division, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency delegated the request for unmanned aerial vehicles to the DIU last August.
In just three months, the Defense Innovation Division selected 16 promising concepts and conducted the first demonstration last December. Nine of the proposed systems were flight-ready, and of those, officials selected four to move to the prototyping stage.
It is noted that the DIU selected proposals that approached the problem in different ways. Although there was a requirement for a flight range of at least 50 km, two drones have a flight range of about 100 km, and the other two can fly over a distance of more than 1000 km. It is noted that the drones must be low-visibility, have multiple two-way communication channels and be equipped with mission planning software. The Department says that they want to see modular systems that can integrate new equipment or software in a matter of hours.
The smaller systems that DIU is considering cost less than $20,000 each, while the price of larger drones approaches $70,000, depending on the cost of cameras and other subsystems, as well as the number of systems that the U.S. Department of Defense ultimately purchases.
The goal, DIU officials said, is «massive deployment,» although it is unclear exactly how many drones the ministry will purchase. As part of its assessment, DIU will consider each supplier’s manufacturing capabilities and how quickly it can deliver large quantities.
The representative of the Department noted that one of the Ukrainian companies is already producing about 200 systems each month to support operations against Russian occupation forces.
The WSJ previously reported that American drones have «disappointed» on the battlefield, so defense startups have joined forces with Ukrainian manufacturers to create better, war-tested aircraft for the US military.
Recently, Skiftech, a Ukrainian manufacturer of tactical simulators for training fighters based on laser technologies, was among 10 companies that received a 10-year contract worth $921.1 million from the US Army.
