Safran Teams Up With French Air Navigation Service Provider to Integrate Drones in Civil Airspace

June 19, 2015

-

The French air navigation service provider, DSNA (direction des services de la navigation aérienne), the leading provider of air navigation services in Europe, and Safran, a world leader in optronics, avionics, electronics and critical software for both civil and defense markets, today signed an agreement to work together on the integration of drones in civil airspace.

The aim of this agreement is to pool the two partners' resources and expertise to jointly bid on contracts offered within the scope of the European research program SESAR 2020. SESAR (Single European Sky ATM Research) is a European program designed to modernize air traffic management systems, financed by the European Commission and the Trans-European Transport Network, TEN-T.

The agreement mainly covers research & development projects concerning anti-collision technologies ("Detect & Avoid") and associated procedures. The ability to automatically detect and avoid possible collisions, identical to the "see & avoid" function on aircraft, is in effect the technological and regulatory key to the future integration of drones in air traffic. The DSNA and Safran, building on their collaboration through ODREA, a European project financed by the SESAR JU (Joint Undertaking), plan to develop an initial "Detect & Avoid" operational capability.

Source : Safran S.A. (Paris: SAF.PA)