United Kingdom Defense Seeks Technology to Protect Physical Assets from Drone Attack
The MOD is seeking proposals that enhance physical defensive countermeasures which can be used to mitigate an Uncrewed Aerial System (UAS) kinetic attack. The Counter UAS (C-UAS) technology market currently focuses on targeting the UAS in flight. This call to industry and academia for proposals aims to shift away from conventional C-UAS methods and instead explore the most effective ways to physically safeguard various assets from hostile UAS. This includes options for hardening the asset, providing blanket last-ditch defense and deploying automated alerts for incoming hostile UAVs.
The war in Ukraine has demonstrated how vulnerable a wide range of military and civilian assets can be to UAS being used as part of a kinetic attack. The conflict has therefore seen widespread deployment of C-UAS capabilities, such as Detect, Track, and Identify technologies, as well as electronic or kinetic effectors to stop a UAS in flight.
The widespread use of UAS has demonstrated three main limitations in the deployments of C-UAS technologies:
1. Countermeasures are not always located in the right place to prevent a UAS attack
2. Difficulty of maintaining a cohort of trained personnel who are also located in the right place to prevent a UAS attack
3. Countermeasures don’t fully mitigate the ever-developing UAS capabilities and tactics deployed to circumvent these technologies
These factors highlighted to the MOD the need to go back to basics and underpin C-UAS technology with physical last ditch security countermeasures which can mitigate the effects of a kinetic UAS attack. The C-UAS technology market currently focuses on targeting the UAS in flight. This call for proposals complements this work by concentrating on how best to protect an asset from an air raid by hostile UAS, including scenarios where the outer line of defense is breached or absent.
These measures will be the last line of defense when all other mitigations have proven ineffective. It is anticipated that these physical security countermeasures will provide a vital role in protecting critical assets and infrastructure around the UK, and also have a military application for protecting deployed assets overseas.
The MOD is inviting industry and academia to leverage novel physical protective countermeasures that can be utilized to reduce, or completely mitigate, the threat posed by one or more UAS being used as a weapon to fly into an asset and/or drop an explosive payload onto an asset.
The size of the protected asset can range from a single person through to a vehicle or a large building. Proposals need to outline the expected protection envelope for their proposed solutions in order to allow the MOD to scope the proposal against a range of end use cases within three scenarios. The scenarios will cover:
Scenario 1: Protection of a permanent asset (static)
Scenario 2: Protection of a temporary asset (static)
Scenario 3: Protection of an asset on the move
Proposals accepted by the MOD will be supported by a proof-of-concept trial, based upon the three scenarios, demonstrating the ability of the working design to protect an asset from an inbound UAS air raid.
The MOD is seeking proposals:
• That produces evidence of a working design that has been validated in a recognized laboratory or a relevant environment to TRL 4 or 5. The MOD welcomes proposals that outline an innovative approach to re-using existing products that have been designed for other industries but which could be applied to the C-UAS protective security measures.
• For countermeasures designed to provide a degree of protection to assets from a range of kinetic energy threats realistically capable of being delivered by known threat and potential threat UAVs.
• For countermeasures that are covertly deployed, or deployable in a discreet manner (i.e. to avoid detection by aerial surveillance). If the countermeasure is not preinstalled, it must be rapidly and remotely deployable on command.
This call for proposals presents potential opportunities for U.S. companies with expertise in C-UAS technologies, physical security and related equipment, technologies and services. U.S. companies have a worldwide reputation for innovative products, after sales service, and training which makes them competitive in the UK market. The U.S. and UK also share similar business cultures and business practices, which makes the UK an attractive market for U.S. suppliers.
If you have novel technology to protect physical assets from drone attack and you would like to learn how to submit a proposal to the MOD, or to learn more about defense opportunities in the UK, please contact PJ Menner at the U.S. Embassy London via PJ.Menner@trade.gov.