Thales and BAE Systems are collaborating on an advanced intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance mast system intended for demonstration on the Herne extra-large autonomous underwater vehicle in 2027.
The partnership brings together Thales’s new ISR mast, currently in development at the company’s optronic facility in Glasgow, with BAE Systems’ Herne XLAUV platform. The mast is described as a stealthy, low-mass system designed specifically for uncrewed and autonomous applications, with a modular architecture allowing sensor payloads to be configured to meet specific operational requirements.
Beyond visual sensing, the system is configurable for electronic warfare, communications and navigation payloads, delivering real-time intelligence to enhance mission effectiveness. Both the mast and the Herne platform are described as platform and payload agnostic respectively, with the combined system designed to demonstrate rapid 360-degree image capture while minimising above-water exposure which is a critical consideration for operations in contested waters where counter-detection poses a direct threat to mission success.
Herne is currently progressing through a certification process with Lloyd’s Register, which we reported on last month, positioning the platform to become the first XLAUV certified under the organisation’s Unmanned Marine Systems Code.
Tommy Cowan, Sea Business Sector Director at Thales, said the collaboration reflected “a shared commitment to ensuring that uncrewed platforms are equipped with the sharpest possible eyes from beneath the waves, supporting the Hybrid Navy approach,” adding that in subsurface operations “the ability to detect, classify and respond to threats faster than an adversary can mean the difference between mission success and failure.”
The two companies have a long history of working together on submarine sensor systems, with their collaboration on subsurface platform optics dating back to the Valiant-class submarine in 1966. The Glasgow facility at the heart of the new mast’s development has supplied optronic systems to every Royal Navy submarine in history, a heritage we explored in detail last year.
I bet there was a Mast Debate meeting before this was erected.
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Again using the french. We need to develop our own capabilities. UK never learns. A clown show. Where’s the french buying loads of equipment from BAE in return?
Thales UK are very much a British company working in Britain, the brand just bought the pre-existing company in Glasgow that has always build RN periscopes. Indeed, Thales France have no expertise in periscopes as the French optronic masts are built by Safran, not Thales.
Thales Glasgow is the old Barr and Stroud. B&S have been making rangefinders since the early 1900s.