RapidFlight, designer and additive producer of attritable, mission-customized, mass-producible drones, efficiently demonstrated its means to quickly design, manufacture, and deploy the SPX, an unmanned aerial car (UAV), to Autonomy Prime specs in lower than 90 days. This was a primary deliverable beneath RapidFlight’s $10 million contract with the U.S. Air Pressure (USAF) AFWERX Autonomy Prime program. The work beneath the contract culminated with profitable three-day coaching effort adopted by USAF-operated flights at Airlie Airfield in Warrenton, Virginia final month.
This mission milestone follows the June 2024 announcement that RapidFlight was tasked with delivering a quickly customizable, mission oriented, autonomous, fixed-wing UAV to deal with pressing Division of Protection necessities. The contract positioned RapidFlight as a key companion within the U.S. Air Pressure’s modernization efforts, leveraging the corporate’s proprietary AgileAviation course of to quickly design and manufacture mission-ready plane.
RapidFlight demonstrated its means to swiftly deploy SPX, a clean-sheet plane, absolutely designed and manufactured to buyer specified mission necessities. RapidFlight then educated USAF personnel in simply three days to efficiently fly and function the plane. This milestone marks a brand new chapter for the SPX platform as a deployable asset for the U.S., different DoD clients, and their allies.
“The SPX demo is a testomony to the innovation and collaboration achieved at an extremely quick tempo,” stated Bennett Steward, AFWERX program supervisor, discussing this system’s progress. “This method to fast and modular UAS design and manufacturing exhibits promise in enhancing Air Pressure operations, particularly as small UAS applied sciences change into more and more related for army methods and aims.”
“This milestone showcases RapidFlight’s means to ship superior options rapidly and to the exacting specs of ever-evolving nationwide protection wants,” stated Mike Uffelman, director of development at RapidFlight. “The SPX’s compliance with key legislative necessities—2020 NDAA Part 848 and 2023 NDAA Part 817—ensures the USAF is provided with protected, dependable, and high-performance UAS know-how. Extra importantly, the success of this collaboration demonstrates a brand new sort of workflow between contractor and the army that may allow the US Armed Forces and its allies to extra readily reply to evolving unmanned battlefield dynamics.”
About AFWERX
Because the innovation arm of the DAF and a directorate throughout the Air Pressure Analysis Laboratory, AFWERX brings cutting-edge American ingenuity from small companies and start-ups to deal with probably the most urgent challenges of the DAF. AFWERX employs roughly 370 army, civilian and contractor personnel at 5 hubs and websites executing an annual $1.4 billion price range. Since 2019, AFWERX has executed over 6,200 new contracts value greater than $4.7 billion to strengthen the U.S. protection industrial base and drive quicker know-how transition to operational functionality.
For extra info, go to: www.afwerx.com
About AFRL
The Air Pressure Analysis Laboratory is the first scientific analysis and improvement middle for the Division of the Air Pressure. AFRL performs an integral function in main the invention, improvement, and integration of inexpensive warfighting applied sciences for our air, house and our on-line world pressure. With a workforce of greater than 12,500 throughout 9 know-how areas and 40 different operations throughout the globe, AFRL gives a various portfolio of science and know-how starting from elementary to superior analysis and know-how improvement.
For extra info, go to www.afresearchlab.com
About RapidFlight
Primarily based in Manassas, Virginia, RapidFlight is a design, know-how, and additive manufacturing firm able to producing 1000’s of personalized, low-cost, mission-ready, unmanned techniques each centrally and on the tactical edge. The corporate’s proprietary digital design and manufacturing processes, referred to as AgileAviation, and skilled staff of trade professionals are setting new requirements in plane customization and mass manufacturing. RapidFlight addresses the dynamic challenges and stringent timelines important to nationwide safety.
For extra particulars, go to www.rapidflight.aero
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