Leonardo will use Shield AI’s Hivemind software to develop autonomy for Proteus, the uncrewed rotorcraft it built with the Royal Navy and UK Defence Innovation, under an agreement that gives the company’s engineers the tools to write their own mission autonomy, according to the companies.
The two firms will work together through the Hivemind software development kit so that Leonardo engineers can build new autonomy capabilities for rotary-wing operations, including anti-submarine warfare, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and contested logistics helicopter operations.
Tom Schaefer, vice president of Hivemind engineering at Shield AI, said: “Leonardo builds some of the most widely flown rotorcraft in the world, and Hivemind gives its engineers new tools to add autonomy to them. Autonomy software is never finished. It changes with the mission, the threat, and the sensors on the aircraft. Leonardo’s engineers can therefore tailor Hivemind software to their mission sets, and the work stays with them.”
Adam Wardrope, vice president for market development in helicopters at Leonardo in Britain, said: “As we look to the demands of our customers and the reality of military and security operations in both wartime and in peacetime, there is a need for autonomy powered by AI. The ability to develop and integrate mission autonomy using Hivemind onto Proteus will support the implementation of autonomous capabilities.
“When combined with our long-standing design, development, and manufacturing expertise in crewed and uncrewed rotorcraft, we believe we will be able to benefit from Shield AI’s software to support the development and delivery of autonomous solutions, potentially also extending it through other programmes within our rotary-wing portfolio.”
Proteus is a vertical take-off and landing technology demonstrator developed with the Royal Navy and UK Defence Innovation under the Rotary Wing Uncrewed Air System programme, designed around a modular payload bay that can take about a tonne of equipment or two standard NATO pallets. That bay is what makes the aircraft interesting, because the same airframe can carry sonobuoys, a radar, or stores for resupply depending on what is bolted into it. The aircraft made its first flight early this year after demonstrations in synthetic scenarios, with Leonardo-designed autonomy already on board.
The Royal Navy’s Maritime Aviation Transformation strategy, which Proteus informs, sets out how maritime aviation develops to 2040, and the Strategic Defence Review’s hybrid navy depends on uncrewed aircraft taking on tasks that currently consume Merlin and Wildcat flying hours. Anti-submarine warfare is the task where the pressure is greatest, with the Defence Committee reporting this month that it is not persuaded British attack submarines are putting to sea as often as they should and that the department has accepted a serious anti-submarine warfare gap.
Shield AI’s Hivemind is the autonomy software behind the company’s V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft, and the arrangement here supplies the toolkit instead of the finished product, so Leonardo owns and sustains what it builds. Keeping that work in house matters for a British programme, because autonomy that cannot be modified without going back to a foreign supplier is autonomy that cannot be adapted at the speed operations demand.
Leonardo employs around 8,000 people in Britain, with its helicopter business based at Yeovil in Somerset, where the Merlin and Wildcat fleets are supported.
What happens when Hivemind is bought by someone who disagrees? How is that risk managed?
The product is owned by Leonardo not hive mind so will also be ITAR free.