Thales, Skydweller to offer solar-powered drone for month-long patrols

PARIS — French defense electronics maker Thales is teaming up with U.S. startup Skydweller Aero, which makes a solar-powered drone with the wingspan of a Boeing 747, to offer an unmanned maritime-patrol aircraft that can remain on station for weeks to months at a time.

The package offered by the two companies will feature the same AI-powered radar that equips the French Navy’s Atlantique 2 crewed maritime-patrol aircraft, said Philippe Duhamel, Thales executive vice president for defense-mission systems, at the Paris Air Show on June 18, after the firms signed a memorandum of understanding.

Thales and Skydweller will initially target military customers, with Thales is now working to integrate the radar in the platform and hoping for contracts “very soon,” Duhamel said.

The system will cost “far less than a Reaper,” with operating costs a factor five to 10 lower than any comparable platform, said Sebastien Renouard, head of international development at Skydweller Aero, referring to the General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper.

“It will be very disruptive,” he said.

Skydweller acts as a “pseudo satellite,” and combined with the Thales smart radar represents a “new paradigm for maritime surveillance,” according to Renouard. The drone is powered by more than 17,000 solar cells and can carry a payload of 400 kilograms.

Skydweller can operate “for days, weeks and months,” Renouard said. “We could certainly fly for a year at some point, but there will be intermediary steps, and those steps are related with the predictive maintenance of both the platform and the payload, because we have nobody on board taking care of this.” He said the company sees 90 days of continuous operation as the first big milestone.

The use case is very different from that of the ATL2 maritime patrol aircraft used by the French Navy, “which doesn’t fly for weeks,” Duhamel said. “Of course, ATL2 has many other functions that Skydweller doesn’t have. So it’s very complementary, it’s permanent surveillance.”

The maritime-patrol version of the Skydweller will be equipped with the Thales AirMaster S, an active electronically scanned array radar operating in the X-band, which Duhamel said has been primarily designed for maritime surveillance. The radar has a range of about 200 kilometers and is able to follow thousands of tracks simultaneously, both on the water and in the air, Duhamel said.

Skydweller is focusing initially on maritime surveillance, where the company feels it’s in a sweet spot as it’s an area where sovereignty is under attack and obtaining intelligence and surveillance is the most difficult, according to Renouard.

AI treatment of the data allows for target classification, limiting the data flow to operators and providing them with a better overview, while the low power consumption makes the AirMaster S suitable for drones, Duhamel said.

Thales and Skydweller have already received interest from several customers, and the companies are talking to military forces, civil emergency services and border control agencies in Europe and the United States, according to Renouard.

“The market for us certainly is military, but not only,” he said.

The solar-powered drone can operate non-stop up to around 40 degrees north and south of the Equator, as well in the polar regions during the summer, while operations during the polar winter would be limited to a day due to the available light, according to the Skydweller executive.

Rudy Ruitenberg is a Europe correspondent for Defense News. He started his career at Bloomberg News and has experience reporting on technology, commodity markets and politics.

巴黎——法国国防电子制造商泰雷兹公司正与美国初创公司 Skydweller Aero 合作，后者生产翼展与波音 747 相当的太阳能无人机，双方将共同提供一种无人海上巡逻机，该飞机可以一次在指定位置停留数周至数月。

泰雷兹公司负责国防任务系统的执行副总裁菲利普·杜哈梅尔在6月18日的巴黎航展上表示，两家公司提供的方案将采用与法国海军“大西洋2”有人驾驶海上巡逻机相同的AI雷达。此前，两家公司签署了一份谅解备忘录。

杜哈梅尔表示，泰雷兹和Skydweller最初将瞄准军方客户，泰雷兹目前正在努力将雷达集成到该平台上，并希望“很快”就能获得合同。

Skydweller Aero 国际发展主管塞巴斯蒂安·雷诺阿表示，该系统的成本将“远低于死神无人机”，其运营成本比任何同类平台低 5 到 10 倍，他指的是通用原子公司的 MQ-9 死神无人机。

“这将造成很大的混乱，”他说。

据雷诺阿称，Skydweller无人机充当“伪卫星”，并与泰雷兹智能雷达相结合，代表了“海上监视的新范式”。该无人机由超过17000块太阳能电池供电，可携带400公斤的有效载荷。

雷诺阿德表示，Skydweller可以“连续运行数天、数周甚至数月”。“我们当然有可能在某个时候连续飞行一年，但这需要一些过渡步骤，这些步骤与平台和有效载荷的预测性维护密切相关，因为目前机上没有人负责这项工作。” 他说，公司将连续运行90天视为第一个重要的里程碑。

杜哈梅尔说，这种用途与法国海军使用的ATL2海上巡逻机截然不同，“ATL2可能几周都不飞行”。“当然，ATL2还有许多Skydweller所不具备的功能。所以它与ATL2非常互补，可以进行持续监视。”

Skydweller海上巡逻机将配备泰雷兹公司的AirMaster S雷达，这是一款工作在X波段的有源相控阵雷达，杜哈梅尔表示，该雷达主要用于海上监视。杜哈梅尔还表示，该雷达探测距离约为200公里，能够同时跟踪数千个目标，无论是在水面还是空中。

据雷诺阿称，Skydweller 最初专注于海上监视，该公司认为这是其优势所在，因为这是一个主权受到攻击、获取情报和监视最为困难的领域。

杜哈梅尔表示，人工智能对数据的处理可以实现目标分类，限制流向操作员的数据量，并为他们提供更好的概览，同时低功耗使 AirMaster S 适用于无人机。

据雷诺阿称，泰雷兹和Skydweller已经收到了几位客户的咨询，两家公司正在与欧洲和美国的军队、民防部门和边境管制机构进行洽谈。

“我们的市场当然是军工市场，但不仅限于此，”他说。

据 Skydweller 公司高管称，这款太阳能无人机可以在赤道南北纬 40 度左右的范围内不间断运行，夏季也可以在极地地区运行，而极地冬季的运行则由于光照不足而仅限于一天。

鲁迪·鲁伊滕贝格是《防务新闻》的欧洲记者。他的职业生涯始于彭博新闻社，拥有报道科技、大宗商品市场和政治方面的经验。