The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) and
Defence Science and Technology (DST) Group Australia have
announced a ground-breaking partnership to develop
next-generation sub-systems for low-cost weapons systems,
bringing together cutting-edge technologies from both nations.
The partnership will combine the UK's Modular Weapons Testbed and
Australia's SHARKTOOTH programme, which features innovative
‘plug-and-launch' modular technology, aimed at accelerating the
employment of advanced, yet affordable weapons technologies. This
integration represents a significant advancement in complex
weapons development and will help accelerate and de-risk
industry's development of guided weapon sub-systems.
Under this collaboration both nations will develop new approaches
and new technologies enhancing future weapon systems capability,
including low-cost seekers (sensors which are responsible for
detecting and tracking targets), additively manufactured engines
(created by 3D printing or similar), modular warheads and fuses,
algorithms to improve guidance, navigation and control and other
novel weapons technologies.
The partnership will deliver several key advantages:
- reduced development costs and risks through shared expertise
- accelerated deployment of new capabilities
- enhanced interoperability between UK and Australian forces
- develop and demonstrate innovation ideas from both nations,
helping to invest in sovereign defence ecosystems
- flexible, modular design allowing rapid adaptation to
emerging threats.
The collaboration enables both nations to access a wider pool of
innovative ideas, co-operate on technology development and
deliver faster against a broader range of operational use cases.
For both the UK and Australia
this will strengthen defence primes, small to medium-sized
enterprises (SMEs) and academia in
support of Defence Equipment and Support (DE&S) and the
UKMinistry of Defence's
Complex Weapons Pipeline and Australia's Guided Weapons and
Explosive Ordnance (GWEO) Enterprise.
Each nation is developing a concept demonstrator equivalent to a
concept car to enable us to prove future technologies before they
go into sovereign industrial and military capabilities.
SHARKTOOTH is Australia's developmental weapon system, a small
missile which will enable rapid integration of various components
including sensors, warheads, guidance systems and propulsion
units.
A spokesperson for Dstl said:
This collaboration represents a step-change in how we develop and
deploy complex weapons systems.
By combining Australia's modular approach with the UK's missiles know-how, we're creating
more versatile and capable systems for our armed forces.
