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Europe’s leading provider of rotary unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) platforms, UMS SKELDAR, has announced the company has grown to nearly 100 employees over the past year.
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The company has grown by over 70 per cent at its Swedish facility, as well as a 30 per cent increase in Switzerland. UMS SKELDAR said it “ramped up its workforce and accelerated production lines for the world-leading rotary VTOL UAV ‘SKELDAR V-200’ and its variants to fulfil a string of new contract wins”.
“With significant numbers of orders, we have planned a ramp up of resources and that includes the highly skilled technical workforce and management teams who design, build, fly and maintain our rotary UAV portfolio,” said Axel Cavalli-Bjorkman, chief executive of UMS SKELDAR.
“This is an exciting time for UMS SKELDAR and underlines that the worldwide strategic focus on navy and maritime customers was exactly the right decision leveraging our unmatched capabilities. These include NATO STANAG (Standardisation Agreement) compliance such as the Hirth heavy fuel engine, which in turn has allowed us time between overhauls (TBO) far superior to any of our competitors and the confidence of proven payload sensors such as the ViDAR optical radar systems.”
The company confirmed it will “continue to build strategic international relationships”, including with an Australian company:
- German partners ESG, working as prime lead for the German navy contract and Bundeswehr manned–unmanned teaming (MUM-T) of helicopters trials.
- Incorporation of innovative two-stroke engine products and technologies, through acquisition of the Hirth business including research, development and manufacturing from its site at Benningen, near Stuttgart, Germany, with global sales co-ordinated from Vienna, Austria.
- Nordic Unmanned and NORCE Norwegian Research Centre AS for European Maritime Safety Agency multi-role operations.
- Alongside partner Saab as part of OCEAN2020, the most important project related to the European Defence Agency initiative. With demonstrations scheduled in the Mediterranean Sea in 2019, co-ordinated by the Italian Navy, and in 2020 in the Baltic Sea, conducted by the Swedish Navy.
- In Australia with Airflite, to provide exclusive maintenance, repair and overhaul and technical support services for the rotary unmanned UAV portfolio and Sentient Vision Systems’ ViDAR, an airborne persistent wide area maritime search system.
“Our support for twin operations in Sweden and Switzerland with centres of excellence for prototype manufacturing and testing, supported by R&D and avionics and software development, plays to the considerable strengths of our multinational workforce of experts and highly motivated individuals working as one team,” said Cavalli-Bjorkman.
