Periodic Reporting for period 2 - KNOX (Cost advantageous and scalable drone alarm and protection system for urban contexts)
Berichtszeitraum: 2018-08-01 bis 2019-07-31
The overall objective of the KNOX project was to optimize, fully demonstrate and setup commercialization of the KNOX counter-drone solution by:
• Deploying and testing the KNOX system (Optimization based on end-user output; effectiveness, price, portability, user-friendliness etc.).
• Testing and demonstrating the technical effectiveness of KNOX in real operational environments.
• Developing and defining Standard Operation Procedures.
• Analyzing needed approvals, certifications and establishment of documentation for certification.
• Preparing market entry, organizational capability and project planning.
• Studying the markets continuously and networking to prepare further market expansion.
Conclusion
The EU funded Horizon 2020 project “KNOX” has been a success for MD and the participants within it.
It has provided unprecedented knowledge about state-of-the-art technologies and matched them with the ever-increasing demands for protection against malicious use of drones. Major obstacles were known from the beginning and overcome, like the EU-wide regulations against jamming that proved to be a continuous burden to keep the pace in the project when specifically jamming had to be demonstrated and proven. But it was achieved in several occasions to find collaborative authoritative partners and get the approvals in place to test the technology.
Our competitiveness has been improved, and the KNOX technologies and products have been heavily improved throughout the project to meet the customer needs and create the needed situational awareness about drone activities in these areas.
Today the system is fully active and incorporated into the daily operations in two prisons. There will be continuous improvements to be made to the technologies going forward as the threat continues to evolve into more sophisticated methods of smuggling contraband into prisons, threatening stadium security or harassing air traffic safety in airports.
During the project period in the past 2 years MD have been in contact with several policy makers, public and private security service providers and critical infrastructure owners to gain insight into and align with their security visions and daily operations requirements.
Our KNOX-related efforts have been entrepreneurial in nature and will set new standards as key components in the coming infrastructure of equipment and data.
In summary, through the innovation project KNOX, MyDefence managed to demonstrate the full KNOX concept including the technological and tactical effectiveness. The result became a collection of showcases/use-cases based on the demonstration activities and a finalized full KNOX solution, providing the basis for the sales to security services providers.
The KNOX system consists of distributed RF-sensors and a radar, respectively named Watchdog and Eagle. The effector is a distributed RF-jammer named Dobermann. Our RF sensors have been significantly upgraded to include direction finding, the false alarm rate has been reduced to an absolute minimum and our approach to jamming is the most compact in the market. The usage inside urban areas with a condensed RF noise environment has been improved significantly.
Our system in general has proven to be very flexible and the scalability is unseen in the market, which makes it very cost effective. Our Radar is the lowest cost on the market and as part of the total system a very important component. The drone classification has improved significantly resulting in a low false alarm rate with minimal user interaction. Our C2-system has gone from being local and site-specific to be a scalable multi-site system capable of sharing data between different sites with the aim of going towards a larger infrastructure. Our suppliers, especially local electronic manufacturer, has been instrumental for our rapid prototyping and changes needed for the continued product development. Our brand awareness has risen significantly, and our sales efforts has resulted in customers related to prisons, police forces and public safety.
MyDefence have created output (knowledge, technology, design, SOPs) from the project, which is contributing to a state-of-the-art commercially available anti-drone solution.
The KNOX system is ready for contributing to protecting critical infrastructures, private properties and mobile soft targets. MyDefence is able, with the KNOX system, to strengthen the security against drones and meet the market need for a commercially available anti-drone solution capable of early detecting the presence of any drone within a no-fly zone or defensive perimeter, jamming its activity without interfering with other mobile signals and forcing the drone to a safe landing.
MyDefence is becoming one of the strongest competitive players in the international anti-drone security systems industry and is as such setting the foundation for creating a new industry of KNOX solutions in Europe and grow related sub-suppliers.