The French Defense Innovation Agency – an agency similar to the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) – signed a contract with Nexter on June 16 to build a new medium-range, remotely operated munition under the “Larinae” project, which was launched in early May.
Nexter and its partners’ proposed solution includes an unmanned aerial system (UAS) manufactured by French vendor EOS Technologie, along with core-generating charge technology produced by Nexter, and a GPS-independent navigation system capable of operating in contested environments from startup TRAAK. It’s intended to have a range of at least 80 kilometers (nearly 50 miles) and to remain autonomous for three hours.
The French defense ministry declined to give a price tag for the project.
Nexter – which is part of the European land defense systems group KNDS alongside Germany’s Krauss-Maffei Wegmann – touted the munition’s proposed ability to “thwart” active defenses of armored vehicles before piercing their armor. It will also contain an optronic ball capable of detecting vehicles 15 kilometers away by day, three kilometers by night, and which allows operators to observe terrain from afar.
The French government has prioritized developing a low-cost unmanned solution that can neutralize armored vehicles between 5 and 50 kilometers away. Larinae focuses on the higher end of that distance, and a second project, “Colibri” – or Hummingbird – focuses on the lower end.
The use of loitering munitions has gained attention since the Azerbaijan-Armenia Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in 2020 and Ukraine's defense against Russian invaders since 2022.
Source: DefenceNews
