The European Commission (EC) has announced the projects to be funded by the European Defense Industrial Development Program (EDIDP). Intracom Defense, as the head of 2 European consortia, submitted proposals for 2 of the 16 projects that were approved.
IDE’s proposals were selected from 40 submitted, after evaluation by an EU Committee of Experts with criteria: their contribution to excellence, innovation, competitiveness in the European defense industry and EU’s industrial autonomy.
This important development confirms once again the international dynamics, the know-how and the reliability of IDE, and concerns the following 2 projects:
· LOTUS (Low Observable Tactical Unmanned Air System)
Design, development, production of prototypes, and testing of a new generation Tactical Unmanned Aerial Vehicle. LOTUS is an innovative aircraft with stealth design (very small acoustic, thermal, electromagnetic trace), self-protection measures, advanced autonomy functions and advanced processing algorithms for detecting, recognizing and categorizing targets based on AI (Artificial Intelligence) technologies.
It is a next generation “European Tactical Unmanned Aerial Vehicle”, suitable for the most effective surveillance of borders and migration flows, as well as for multilateral monitoring of high value assets at sea and on land.
It is important to note that the consortium led by IDE consists of partners from Greece (IDE, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, CFT, ALTUS, University of Patras, and Telecommunications and Electronics Factory of the Hellenic Air Force General Staff), Cyprus (SignalGenerix, Cyric, Geoimaging), Spain (Embention) and the Netherlands (RHEA Group). The project has a budget of € 9.7 million.
· SMOTANET (Software Defined Mobile Ad-hoc Tactical Network Devices and Testbed)
Design and development of an innovative “network of tactical communications”. The innovation of the project lies in the combined use at a tactical level of three different technologies Software Defined Radios, Mobile Ad-hoc Networks (MANET) and Software Defined Networking for the first time in Europe, resulting in more efficient network management, improved communications security and better interoperability with other networks.
The consortium led by IDE consists of partners from Greece (IDE, Gridnet, Athens University of Economics and Business), Cyprus (SignalGenerix) and Poland (ITTi) and the project has a budget of € 3.9 million.
Great emphasis should be given to the contribution of Greece and Cyprus Ministries of Defense, who agreed to actively support the two proposals with their joint commitment to issue Operational and Technical Requirements, to co-finance the projects if required, and to express interest for the procurement of the product to be developed.