Technological challenges
Each military environment has specificities that strongly impact the design and the characteristics of AS affecting not only the way they can be used but also their technological configuration (e.g., sensors, algorithms, effectors, etc.) required to operate in a safe and effective way. Furthermore, challenges increase in highly complex multidomain operational scenarios that require a growing use of coordinated assets. Modern collaborative battlespace requires higher flexibility and adaptability for gaining superiority and dominance and ensuring mission success in an environment where multiple systems, assets and protocols coexist in the same mission. The combination of heterogeneous multi-asset AS have the potential to significantly improve overall mission responsiveness and overcome shortcomings showed by platforms operated individually, but require extensive research on large operationalising cross-domain, non-homogeneous collaborative autonomous teams (swarming) and human interfaces for control and interaction.
Main technological challenges and priorities can be clustered in the following topics:
- Enhanced sensing capacity.
- Enhanced thinking/decision capacity.
- Enhanced acting capacity.
- Enhanced mobility.
- Enhanced teaming capacity.
- Enhanced self-monitoring and self-protection.
- Enhanced communications and networking.
- Enhanced system architecture.
Furthermore, the defence sector must be more proactive with its engagement with the civil sector to make the right investments to capitalize on emerging technologies. This implies adjustments to old processes, to strengthen innovation and counter the fragmentation of the civil-defence innovation landscape.
Research and Technology approach
The military domain should speed-up the technology development and innovation cycles considering both capability pull and technology push perspectives. In this sense, and to speed up the conversion of ideas and concepts to high TRL solutions, promote end-user involvement with researchers and development teams, and foster rapid learning through iterative testing and development, three complementary technological layers should be considered, namely:
- Technology discovery activities – aimed to identify ideas and concepts, and enable their translation into low TRL solutions, through a mix of prospective tools for a long-term perspective (e.g., call for papers), for a mid-term perspective (e.g., innovation prizes, technology foresight activities), and for a short-term perspective (e.g., challenges, proof-of-concept, and OB studies).
- Technology development and integration activities up to TRL 6 – to be launched through CapTechs and EDF research projects, especially focused on the development of system and subsystem demonstrators up to TRL 6.
- Technology development and integration activities above TRL 6 – especially focused on the development of system demonstrators above TRL 6.
Considering the change of paradigm where civilian innovation for commercial purpose is the driver of most technological advancements, there is the need to increasingly engage the private sector to capitalize on emerging technologies, ensure cross-fertilisation between civil and defence industries (spin-ins and spin-offs), leverage dual-use technologies for military applications, strengthen innovation, and counter the fragmentation of the civil-defence innovation landscape.
In addition, given the pace of technological development and change, and to address the challenge of speeding up the conversion of ideas and concepts into high TRL solutions and bridging the “valley of death” between low TRL demonstrators and high TRL prototypes and capabilities, there is the need for a mix of actions with traditional and non-traditional methods of design, development and testing, that brings together incremental innovation (e.g., ad hoc projects) and short-cycle innovation (e.g., scouting, experimentation, challenges, proof-of-concepts), to take benefit of incremental developments for long term maturation of defence technologies and short-cycles adoption of mature technologies, to enable the effective and efficient exploitation of autonomy for defence applications.