Recognizing the growing importance and added value of military autonomous systems, Member States tasked EDA to develop a comprehensive Action Plan on Autonomous Systems (APAS).
Approved on 11 January this year, the action plan is designed to support the Member States to accelerate the development of highly effective, efficient, and reliable autonomous systems for land, air, maritime, and cross-domain operations.
The plan addresses the needs for autonomous systems outlined in the Strategic Compass and the Capability Development Plan (CDP), while also tackling new challenges identified from the lessons of the Ukraine war. Furthermore, it is aligned with the collaborative opportunities described in the Coordinated Annual Review on Defence (CARD).
APAS objectives
- Enhance the performance of individual unmanned systems (UxS).
- Develop/enhance cooperative autonomous systems.
- Enable manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) within and across operational domains.
APAS action lines
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Discover, develop, and integrate technology to enhance the AS abilities, including sensing, decision-making, mobility, action, teaming, self-protection, and self-monitoring.
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Enhance enabling technologies such as AI, network infrastructure (i.e., the ability to transmit data, store it and make it available and usable for different processes and purposes), and modular and open system architectures aimed at ensuring interoperability, cost effective AS, and compatibility with legacy equipment.
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Overcome non-technological challenges with impact on technology such as on concept development and experimentation (CD&E), test, validation and verification (V&V), certification, taxonomy, regulation, ethics, standardisation, and concept development.
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Increase coherence and synchronization between EDA activities on AS and activities of the European Defence Fund (EDF), the Preparatory Action on Defence Research (PADR), the European Defence Industrial Development Programme (EDIDP), the Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO), the relevant European Defence Technology and Industrial Base (EDTIB), other relevant EU entities, and NATO activities.
The APAS includes 66 technological action lines, from which 11 are defined in the technology discovery layer, 30 in the layer of technology development and integration up to TRL 6, and 25 in the layer of technology development and integration above TRL 6.
Furthermore, the action plan also includes 8 action lines related to test, validation and verification; 9 related to standardisation; 6 related to certification; 1 related to regulation; 2 related to communication with stakeholders; the development of a comprehensive and unified taxonomy for isolated and cooperative Land, Air, Maritime and cross-domain autonomous systems; and also proposes recommendations on ethics.
APAS concept
Considering the unbalanced technology maturity over operational domains, the effective use of AS will notably depend on EU ability to leverage the right technology across domains and to integrate these technologies in new and legacy equipment. To this end, the action plan proposes three cumulative phases with a 5-year duration each, which will implement three complementary and parallel work-strands:
- Work-strand 1 focuses on enhancing isolated unmanned systems and improving their interactions with humans.
- Work-strand 2 supports the development of cooperative autonomous systems and the enhancement of machine-machine interactions, with an emphasis on semi-autonomous systems.
- The 3rd work-strand aims to enable manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) within and across operational domains, through larger, more mature swarms of autonomous systems, focusing on close-to-fully autonomous systems for different applications, excluding lethal autonomous weapons.
The APAS proposes an agile methodology to bring together incremental innovation and short-cycle innovation, which differ in pace, industry, and technology types, but whose coexistence takes benefit of incremental developments for long term maturation of defence technologies and short-cycle adoption of mature technologies with top-down direction of capability needs. It also proposes an extensive use of CD&E to speed up the conversion of ideas and concepts to high TRL solutions, foster end-user involvement with researchers and development teams, and create a more vibrant ecosystem by adding new partners to the already existent collaboration base. This approach will provide opportunities for rapid learning through iterative testing and development, contribute to build operational trust on AS, and bridge the “valley of death” between low TRL demonstrators and high TRL prototypes and capabilities.
The APAS is to be implemented through multiple mechanisms, including EDA and EDF activities.
To ensure an integrated coordination, the action relies on a cross-functional Ad Hoc Working Group on Autonomous Systems (AHWG AS).
Download the APAS Brochure here.