What's next for the Pentagon after the Replicator programme?
Although the Replicator initiative has made several accomplishments, there are still multiple gaps to plug across the US Department of Defense (DoD) and its services.
Blue Bear has opened its 5G-enabled beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) flight test facility in Bedfordshire, UK, the company announced on 26 March.
The air corridor for UAS testing at the National BVLOS Experimental Centre (NBEC) was made possible by funding from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sports. Blue Bear is part of the 5G Rural Integration Test-bed consortia which is trialling the use of 5G technology in a range of applications to connect rural communities.
The 16km NBEC air corridor connects Blue Bear’s Twinwoods Flight Test Centre and Cranfield University’s Airport and allows UAS and manned aircraft to share the same airspace.
Blue Bear performed the first BVLOS flights from the NBEC in December 2018 and will continue to instrument and achieve flight hours along the air corridor throughout 2019 with support from the NBEC consortia and the UK CAA.
Different types of 5G technology are being used to track and identify UAS along the corridor, as part of a multi-technology solution for the provision of a recognised air picture from Blue Bear facilities. Thales’s holographic radar will form a part of the solution, as will the provision of mobile 5G solutions from Vodafone.
Ian William-Wynn, managing director of Blue Bear, said: 'Blue Bear first flew their drones BVLOS in 2009. We opened NBEC to allow other drone operators and equipment suppliers to fly and test their next generation
technology in managed environments and scenarios representative of real operations. This facility will accelerate the uptake of UK’s latent drone technology and infrastructure in global markets.'
Although the Replicator initiative has made several accomplishments, there are still multiple gaps to plug across the US Department of Defense (DoD) and its services.
Cummings Aerospace presented its turbojet-powered Hellhound loitering munition at SOF Week 2025, offering a man-portable solution aligned with the US Army’s LASSO requirements.
PDW has revealed its Attritable Multirotor First Person View drone at SOF Week 2025, offering special operations forces a low-cost, rapidly deployable platform for strike and ISR missions, inspired by battlefield lessons from Ukraine.
Teledyne FLIR is highlighting the emerging requirements for 'recoverable and re-usable' loitering munitions across the contemporary operating environment during this week’s SOF Week conference in Tampa, Florida.
High-performance maritime industry player Kraken Technology Group, based in the UK, has used the SOF Week conference in Tampa, Florida this week to debut its K3 Scout uncrewed surface vessel (USV) to the North American market.
Red Cat and Palladyne AI recently conducted a cross-platform collaborative flight involving three diverse heterogeneous drones.