Airbus‘ defense and space subsidiary has received the approval of the European Aviation Safety Agency for the design and development of potential civil-certified unmanned aircraft systems. The Design Organization Approval for UAS expands the company’s existing DOA for conventional manned aircraft in support of efforts to achieve civil type certification for Airbus DS aerial drones, the company said Thursday. “Establishing […] More

Airbus Group plans to develop an autonomous flying vehicle platform concept to fly over traffic jams in an effort to relieve urban congestion and address traffic concerns that resulted from urbanization in “megacities.” The aerospace conglomerate said in a report its A3 outpost has pursued an individual passenger and cargo transport autonomous flying vehicle platform project coined Vahana that has scheduled first vehicle […] More

General Atomics has received an experimental certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration for its Predator C Avenger remotely piloted aircraft. The FAA certificate would allow the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems-built Avenger system to operate in the U.S. National Airspace System, the company said Monday. The Avenger unmanned aerial vehicle has an electro-optical/infrared sensor, Lynx radar […] More

Industry partners will invest in and work to develop a contract for the Thales Alenia Space-led Stratobus high-altitude platform station, Space News reported Thursday. Peter de Selding writes the French-Italian group expects to add telecommunications payloads when HAPS systems become authorized to operate in Ka- and Ku-band. “We expect to have our first contract in 2017 to develop […] More

Cobham has agreed to support maintenance of a ground control station for the British air force’s MQ-9 Reaper remotely piloted aircraft system under a contract with General Atomics‘ aeronautical systems business. Cobham said Friday it will help maintain the Reaper GCS and the Sentry Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition system at RAF Waddington as well as the rear crew training platform at Royal Naval Air Station Culdrose. “Technicians have completed […] More

Andy Von Stauffenberg, a former U.S. Navy aviation electrician and Northrop Grumman engineer, has launched VStar Systems — a systems integration company that specializes in robotics and unmanned aerial systems for government and commercial clients. In a VStar press release posted Thursday, Stauffenberg said he established the company in 2015 to offer integration services for UAV customers. “There are hundreds of […] More

Boeing’s Insitu subsidiary has established a business unit that will work to assist commercial clients in their data collection and processing efforts through unmanned aerial systems. Insitu said Monday the new unit will offer several products and services including aerial vehicles, Inexa Control software designed to operate UAS and Catalina and TacitView software for multi-sensor […] More

AeroVironment, SmartC2 and NASA have forged a partnership to perform a second phase of field tests on the space agency’s unmanned traffic management technology in October. AeroVironment said Thursday researchers will assess the Puma AE’s onboard autopilot three-dimensional geo-fencing functions, backup data link command-and-control and ADS-B integration into NASA’s UTM research platform. SmartC2 will deploy its VirtualAirBoss aviation business […] More

NASA plans to demonstrate detect-and-avoid platforms onboard a General Atomics-built Ikhana unmanned aerial system by end of April in support of the Federal Aviation Administration’s efforts to develop policies on the integration of UAS with the national airspace system. The planned demonstration will run through June at the space agency’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in California and will be the fourth […] More

Qualcomm has been authorized by the Federal Aviation Administration to conduct unmanned aerial systems test flights at the company’s San Diego facility. The telecommunications conglomerate said April 7 it plans to test UAS autonomous operations and other tools that include a 4G/5G communication link intended to help protect other aircraft and people on the ground. Under this FAA certificate of authorization, Qualcomm is […] More

Praxis Aerospace Concepts International has partnered with Griffiss International Airport in Oneida County, New York in an effort to help NASA explore methods for the safe integration of unmanned aerial vehicles into the national airspace system. PACI said Monday it will support a UAV test site at Griffiss International Airport under a potential five-year indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract that Oneida […] More

The U.S. Air Force has agreed to share a runway at North Dakota-based Grand Forks Air Force Base with Northrop Grumman and General Atomics for the service branch and companies to test unmanned aerial vehicles. Sen. John Hoeven’s office (R-N.D.) said Wednesday the service branch signed a joint use agreement with Grand Sky Business and Technology Park to allow Northrop […] More