Unmanned Aerial Vehicle The latest drone news
LiveLink Aerospace, a tech company based in West Sussex, has provided a counter-drone sensor for frontline use by the Royal Navy.
As the use of unmanned air systems (UAS) like drones continues to rise – posing a risk to both military forces and vital national infrastructure – it’s now more important than ever to develop a portable, cost-efficient solution that can be easily integrated with existing systems.
It was with such a solution in mind that the team at LiveLink Aerospace first engaged with the Home Office’s Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA), a funding mechanism for innovative new technologies, back in 2020.
They went on to spearhead a consortium which ultimately produced a flexible and scalable sensor unit for tracking multiple UAS, called passive detection and ranging (PDAR).
The PDAR system uses conventional software defined radios, reprogrammable integrated circuits, and an innovative implementation of convolutional neural networks (CNN) technology to detect radio frequencies emitted by drones.
With the help of AI, as well as a command-and-control station also developed by LiveLink Aerospace, data from each individual sensor is gathered and used to detect, alert and predict UAS threats and increase situational awareness in the operational area.
The technology was the first to be trialled aboard XV Patrick Blackett, a Royal Navy test vessel for new defence innovations commissioned in 2022.
LiveLink Aerospace now plans to expand its team and recruit more experts to continue development on and meet demand for its system.
The company is also exploring air defence technologies and alternative position, navigation, timing and communication (PNTC) technologies which don’t rely on expensive and vulnerable satellites.
