German startup announces imminent arrival of fully autonomous strike drones

The era of fully automated strike drones is becoming technologically feasible. This was stated by the German startup Stark, which specializes in the development of drones against the background of the escalation of the global race for the invention of weapons capable of independently selecting and hitting targets. This is reported by UNN with reference to the Financial Times.

Details

Managing Director of the Munich-based company Stark, Philip Lockwood, said that the deployment of next-generation drones that do not require human approval to select and strike targets has already become achievable.

Russia's war in Ukraine has accelerated investment in drone technology. Some companies are preparing to release high-precision and lethal devices at a price significantly lower than the cost of tanks or missiles. Many unmanned systems can already move autonomously and track moving targets.

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Although the EU has expressed support for a ban on fully autonomous weapons, it has yet to adopt legislation on the issue. And efforts to conclude an international treaty within the UN that would enshrine such a ban are progressing slowly.

But Lockwood, who previously headed the innovation department at NATO, warned that other regions may have fewer doubts about deploying such weapons.

I think we should make sure that our adversaries, such as Russia and China... don't worry about how these systems are used 

Stark's first drone, the OWE-V, launched last week, has built-in software that allows it to make real-time decisions to avoid other combat systems. It can also launch vertically and hit targets up to 100 km away.

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Lockwood said the company has controls in place to ensure that a human "is aware" of any decisions made.

At this stage, we are not sure about reducing these controls

Traditional arms manufacturers have refuted claims by their new competitors that drones, which can cost from a few thousand to hundreds of thousands of euros, will allow governments to replace some of the large costs of armaments.

Addition

The American company Anduril has become one of the biggest beneficiaries of the growing demand for new technologies. Hundreds of its Altius-600M drones have been purchased by the Pentagon and sent to the front lines of Ukraine. Among other companies is the Turkish drone manufacturer Baykar.

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In Europe, in addition to the Munich-based competitor Helsing and the reconnaissance drone manufacturer Quantum Systems, founded by Florian Seidel, who is also behind Stark, among the startups in this industry that are trying to increase their popularity is Tekever, which creates drones for intelligence and surveillance.

Reminder

Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov stated that 97%-98% of components for drones are produced in Ukraine, and one drone manufacturer has 100% of components made in Ukraine.