The collaboration between Revolution Aerospace and Thales Australia marks a major milestone before the anticipated live trial in the Whitsundays in June 2024.
Brisbane, April 09, 2024 - Revolution Aerospace (RevAero) Australia achieved a significant milestone in UAS Traffic Management (UTM) on March 21, 2024. After 15 months of collaboration between RevAero and Thales Australia, the team demonstrated a suite of strategic and tactical deconfliction scenarios within a collaborative, synthetic UTM ecosystem. Completing the research, development, and integration between RevAero and Thales is a key preparatory activity for a live trial of long-range middle- and last-mile cargo delivery by drone, scheduled to take place in the Whitsundays in June 2024. The Whitsundays trial will showcase end-to-end drone cargo delivery, featuring a variety of drone types, delivery distances, and scenarios in uncontrolled airspace, with the UTM system as key enabling technology used throughout.
The UTM demonstration conducted in Brisbane, was provided to local, state, and federal government agencies, as well as a diverse range of industry representatives including key Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM). One of the more advanced technological developments is the routing and scheduling algorithms developed by RevAero, which coordinate and deconflict thousands of operations across multiple UTM Service Suppliers, while accounting for real-world factors such as delays before and during flights and maximising efficient use of the airspace.
RevAero’s UTM capability also incorporates constraint management and conformance monitoring services, which work seamlessly with RevAero’s low Size, Weight, and Power (SWaP) Detect and Avoid (DAA) payload, designed to deconflict UAV from crewed aircraft. This allows RevAero to demonstrate real-time dynamic rerouting and tactical deconfliction, not just for UAV-UAV conflicts, but also conflicts between crewed aircraft and UAVs operating in close proximity within a UTM ecosystem.
Throughout the event, RevAero and Thales dived into the challenges encountered across a variety of UTM use cases, expanding on the utility of the innovative solutions that have been developed by the team. The enthusiastic participation and insightful enquiries from the guests underscored the potential application of RevAero’s system in solving their unique challenges.
Image: RevAero and Thales UTM and DAA team after the demonstration
Drone based e-commerce is already on our door-step and expected to scale within the next 5-10 years. And UTM will be critical for coordinating the movements of the thousands of movements per hour which comes with scale. While most UTM providers can show-case a drone flying from A-B, and basic capabilities such as platform and pilot registration and conformance monitoring, real progress will only happen when thousands of movements can be deconflicted before and during flight, without assuming away real-life challenges such as the accuracy which different drones can maintain their assigned track, and delays in take-offs or arrivals. RevAero and Thales have really pushed the technological boundaries on this front, and I am excited to see where we can take these important developments.
Dr Terrence Martin
CEO and Co-Founder, Revolution Aerospace
Advanced UTM services are a necessary enabler for dense BVLOS operations into the very near future. As a global leader in UTM thought leadership, we’re excited to put that leadership into play with fully functional services. Our team has done some amazing work and we’re looking forward to offering our solutions in a commercial capacity in the very near future.
Kristian Cruickshank
CTO and Co-Founder, Revolution Aerospace
Implementing drone-based cargo delivery for remote and regional Australian communities requires more than advanced drones. It requires a unified effort from corporations, governments, and regulators to build a supportive ecosystem. Along with our drones Revolution Aerospace is developing UTM and DAA systems that will help shape this future.
Guy Morris
Project Director - EATP
About RevAero
The RevAero mission of “Benefitting society through revolutionary advances in autonomous systems technologies” is firmly aligned with the purpose of the EATP program, exploring the utility of emerging aviation technologies to address community needs, particularly in regional Australia.
Revolution Aerospace (RevAero) - As the consortium lead, the collective experience of the RevAero team in the autonomous systems sector, particularly Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) and UAS Traffic Management (UTM), is fundamental to the deployment and scaling of emerging aviation technology across regional Australia. Since establishment in 2021, RevAero has a team of 20 dedicated engineers, researchers, and subject matter experts (SMEs) in autonomous systems. RevAero co-founders, Dr Terry Martin (CEO) and Mr Kristian Cruickshank (CTO) hold a wealth of experience leading and managing large-scale Emerging Aviation Technologies projects with governments and partners across the globe.
Get in touch
For further information on the project, queries can be sent to eatp@revn.aero and general inquiries to contact@revn.aero.
Thales
Thales - Thales Australia is a trusted partner of the Australian Defence Force and is also present in commercial sectors ranging from air traffic management and ground transport systems to security systems and services. Thales Australia employs over 4,300 people directly and supports over 2,051 jobs along its Australian supply chain. Since 2018 Thales Australia has spent over $1.9 billion with local Australian businesses.
Thales Australia has a history of patient investment to build advanced in-country capability across manufacturing, critical systems, and services. Close collaborative relationships with local customers, Australian SME suppliers and research institutions combined with technology transfer from our global business enables Thales to tailor high quality solutions for Australian and export markets, generating revenue of $1.6 billion in exports over the past 10 years.