Mobile robotic automation is one of the fastest growing international markets. Applications are spread across a range of verticals including logistics, industrial, agricultural and maintenance industries, driven by the need to reduce costs for European providers to compete with alternatives in lower labour-cost areas. Furthermore, with the digital transformation of the European economy while the effective workforce is aging and shrinking , there is a significant drive to increase productivity and quality of highly repetitive low-skilled jobs by robotics. The major challenge that impedes growth of the mobile robotics market is the ability to navigate around unmapped territory . Additional factors are high initial cost and public acceptance. Safe Perception And Navigation for Autonomous Robots proposes a single module for safe and accurate navigation disrupting the mobile robotics market. SPANAR increases the mobile robots utilization potential at a lower cost than existing solution, whilst allowing for increased safety. Its unique combination of sensors and software opens up new markets, allowing for mobile robots in highly dynamic environments, in all-weather conditions, and with combined in- and outdoor functionality. To penetrate global markets, the module is sold to OEMs and tier 1 suppliers of mobile robotics through online sales and distribution. Manufacturing is done inhouse and through trustworthy partners capable of mass-production. Avular will investigate four sub-markets in this feasibility study: warehousing automation, last-mile delivery, inspection & maintenance, and agricultural robotics.

This proposal addresses “Topic 03: Aircraft Systems” of the SESAR ER RPAS call. Drones appear in a large variety of types, configurations and sizes. They are operated in a large variety of operational environments (i.e. locations, classes of airspace). However, it is essential that they interoperate with other drones as well as with manned aircraft. This proposal addresses the on-board technologies for drones that are required in order to implement the Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) concept for drone operations at Very Low Level (VLL) and within the Visual Flight Rules (VFR) environment. The project will cover Detect And Avoid (D&A) systems for cooperative and non-cooperative traffic, auto-pilot systems as well as Communication, Navigation and Surveillance (CNS) systems. This project will identify the available CNS infrastructure and on-board technologies to formulate an implementation approach. Based on this an on-board system concept will be developed and evaluated.

ADACORSA targets to strengthen the European drone industry and increase public and regulatory acceptance of BVLOS (beyond visual line-of-sight) drones, by demonstrating technologies for safe, reliable and secure drone operation in all situations and flight phases. The project will drive research and development of components and systems for sensing, telecommunication and data processing along the electronics value-chain. Additionally, drone lead smart industries with high visibility and place for improvement will be developed which will pave the way for a higher public / industry acceptance of the drone technologies. In particular, ADACORSA will deliver: a) On the component level, functionally redundant and fail-operational radar and LiDAR sensors as well as 3D cameras. In order to reduce risk, time and costs, the project aims to adapt technologies from the automotive sector to the drone market for these components. b) On the system level, hardware and software for reliable sensor fusion and data analytics as well as technologies for secure and reliable drone communication using multipath TCP and registration and identification by developing platforms based on eUICCs/eSIM. c) On an architecture level, fail-operational drone control and investigation a pre-operational Flight Information Management System (FIMS) the integration with CoTS components for Unmanned Air Vehicle Traffic Management System (UTM). Within the project, 35 physical as well as virtual demonstrators of BLVOS, long-range drone flight shall pave the way toward certifiable systems for future integration of drone operations. ADACORSA's innovations will leverage the expertise of a very strong consortium, comprising world renowned industrial (OEMs, Tier-1, Tier-2 and technology providers) and research partners along the complete aviation, semiconductor and also automotive value chains, providing Europe with a competitive edge in a growing drone and drone technologies market.