Copyright © HT Digital Streams Limited All rights reserved. A German soldier using a drone jammer during a recent exercise in Hamburg. (EPA/Shutterstock) Summary Startups from Silicon Valley to Europe and beyond are racing to develop cheap, reliable systems to counter hostile drones. Startups from Silicon Valley to Europe and beyond are racing to develop cheap, reliable systems to counter hostile drones appearing over airports and global shipping lanes far from the battlefield in Ukraine. The systems explode, crash, fire pellets, jam radios, beam lasers and even shoot webs like Spider-Man. The different approaches reflect the multifaceted threat. Hostile drones come in all shapes, sizes, speeds and heights. Some attack while others sniff. They fly alone or in flocks. The environment also dictates the response: Stopping battlefield attacks in Ukraine requires a different approach than protecting infrastructure from spy drones in a crowded European city. Whatever the situation, equipment must be able to be deployed quickly against fleeting incursions and cost no more than its target. Mark Rutte, Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, announced a new initiative last week to help alliance members detect and intercept incoming drones. Across NATO, governments and companies are racing to catch up with Ukraine, which has been forced to revamp drone defenses by Russia’s invasion and relentless attacks. Most solutions are experimental and have limitations, from cost to range, scalability and reliability. Experience shows that a layered approach with multiple systems for detection and response is most effective. View full image Drones were spotted near Copenhagen Airport and other airports in Denmark last month. “Interception is very difficult,” said Sven Kruck, co-CEO of surveillance drone maker Quantum Systems, which is developing its own interceptor. Designing autonomous drones that are precise enough to hit fast-moving targets reliably, yet cheap enough for mass production is a challenge that no company has yet to master. “At the end of the day what you want, if you can, is to get the pilot.” Serhiy Sternenko, a Ukrainian activist who is raising funds to buy interceptors for his country’s military, sees it as one part of a broader arsenal Kiev needs to counter Russian drone attacks, including electronic warfare systems, ground-launched missiles still in development and mobile air defense groups that traverse fields to shoot at drones. NATO militaries take lessons from Ukraine. The U.S. military has been testing battlefield drone defenses for its troops in Europe in recent months, under a program called Project Flytrap. Poland, which faced incursions by Russian drones in September, has already strengthened its defenses. The United Kingdom recently announced that it will work with Ukraine to produce its Octopus drone interceptors in a British factory, which will provide Kyiv with defense while learning from its experience. Germany, which is also moving to draw on Ukraine’s experience, recently fast-tracked legal changes that gave armed forces and federal police more leeway to shoot down enemy drones after intruders repeatedly shut down Munich airport, the country’s second largest. Earlier this month, the country’s armed forces selected Munich-based Tytan Technologies to develop an antidrone system for some bases. The company, created in 2023 by two former students at Munich’s Technical University, produces a semi-autonomous interceptor that looks like a small plane. This automation allows one pilot to target up to eight enemy drones simultaneously using multiple interceptors. The interceptors are being tested in combat in Ukraine, where they are integrated into the military’s network of sensors that detect intruders, said Max Enders, Tytan’s head of business development. Swedish startup Nordic Air Defense is testing highly maneuverable interceptors as light as 9 ounces, designed to hit drones at up to 170 miles per hour, at altitudes up to about 6,000 feet. Its Kreuger 100 projectiles, less than 2 feet long, can be launched from rifles, handguns or crates that hold more than a dozen. The company prices its interceptors at about $5,000 apiece and plans to start delivering them next year. San Francisco-based Mara, a finalist in a recent US Army innovation competition and Project Flytrap participant, is developing compact drone interceptors for critical infrastructure and military equipment, even on the move. Mara is demonstrating its “dirt-cheap” Spike interceptors to other US and NATO military forces, and has recently begun working with Ukrainian units. The company hopes to get an order from the nation’s military, contingent on successful field testing next year, CEO Daniel Kofman said. Projectiles are not the only anti-drone technology. Electro Optic Systems of Australia, which builds ultra-precise lasers to track satellites in space, is now rolling out high-powered units to zap drones. The system dazzles or fires through multiple drones almost simultaneously and can hit up to 20 drones per minute, Chief Executive Officer Andreas Schwer said. Other companies in Israel, Europe and the US are also developing anti-drone lasers. Lasers are best for close range defense because their power decreases over distance. Electro Optic Systems’ lasers, which have been used in Ukraine, work well to protect military assets or public infrastructure such as power plants and government buildings, Schwer said. Microwave systems, now being developed in the US and other countries, may hold more promise than lasers, especially against swarms of drones, if they can be fine-tuned to fry electronics across a swath of air. Ukraine has so far set the standard for drone defense. Years of relentless drone strikes from Russia have forced innovation, and the latest result is a fleet of interceptors that Kyiv says has already shown success in shooting down Shahed drones headed for Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure. View Full Image Ukraine has been hit repeatedly by Russian drone strikes, including a barrage that also included missiles targeting Kyiv on June 17. View Full Image A member of an anti-drone team that launched a surveillance drone in southeastern Ukraine in June. Sternenko, the activist, said he raised funds to buy nearly 3,500 interceptor drones for the Ukrainian military from Ukrainian manufacturer Wild Hornets. The interceptors have a 70% hit rate, he said, and cost about $2,200, a fraction of the price of an air defense missile. Interceptors are only part of a broad anti-drone strategy. Anti-aircraft batteries, such as the German-made Gepard, a tank-like vehicle that fires explosive rounds, are highly effective against low-flying aircraft. Shooting down large, high-altitude combat drones may require missiles. But anti-aircraft batteries have limited range and missiles are expensive. The key to effective defense, experts say, lies in the C4 layer — short for command, control, computer and communications — which identifies intruders and quickly determines the best response. Ukraine has been a laboratory for drone development since the beginning of the war. Peter Thiel-backed Quantum Systems, which primarily makes surveillance drones, was one of the first Western companies to donate materials to Ukraine in 2022. Now Quantum Systems is well established there, with its own design, R&D and manufacturing operations and more than 1,000 drones patrolling Ukrainian skies every day, Quantum Strosbel said. The company’s experimental Jäger—German for “Hunter”—interceptor takes off vertically with propellers, then a solid-fuel rocket shoots it up 15,000 feet in 5 seconds before electric motors take over again. Once locked onto its target, it rams with minimal human intervention. While physical interception is required in a combat zone, it may not be the best approach when drones are hovering over a crowded stadium or a nuclear power plant, Strobel said. In this case, authorities may be better off tracking the intruder down to his pilot. For such situations, Argus Interception, a spin-off from a German university project, has developed A1-Falke, a drone that targets intruders with nets and returns them to base. View full image The A1-Falke captured a drone during an exercise in Hamburg last month. The German military recently demonstrated the system’s capacity during a military exercise in Hamburg. During the test, the drone took off, locked onto an orange hexacopter drone, captured it and returned it intact. “Our use case is minimally invasive intervention in the air,” said Sven Steinräber, a former naval officer and co-founder of Argus. “It’s designed for cases where you want to intervene physically but need to rule out collateral damage.” Get all the Business News, Market News, Breaking News Events and Latest News Updates on Live Mint. Download the Mint News app to get daily market updates. more topics #drones Read next story
Drone threats ignite the eruption of anti-drone wizards
