Thales and UK-based Autonomous Devices have teamed up to develop a drone-mounted electronic-warfare system for maritime and land forces. The joint project will produce the EW-UAS1, combining Thales’ EW payload with a long-endurance, highly maneuverable airframe from Autonomous Devices.
Offered as a turnkey package, the system will provide electronic support measures to detect, classify, and geolocate emitters, plus offensive capabilities such as jamming. Developers say initial trials are underway and will continue through the year as they refine the capability to meet growing demand for both defensive and offensive EW across domains.
Use cases include ship self-protection — using electronic countermeasures to defeat incoming anti-ship missiles and reduce reliance on kinetic interceptors — and broader theatre-level defense by degrading adversary radar and targeting. The platform can also perform passive surveillance to widen early-warning coverage. Rapidly repositionable, the drone senses hostile radar emissions (guidance, targeting, surveillance) and can jam or manipulate them to create deceptive radar returns that mislead operators and divert threats from protected assets.
