INVOLI's recent annoucement around a pre-integrated UTM and Air Traffic Awareness solution for safe, efficient, and scalable drone operations in Europe was a major development. It directly relates to fully integrating unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) into an already crowded airspace across Europe and ties into the initiatives that the European Commission and SESAR are working to enable. As the technological pillar of Europe’s ambitious Single European Sky (SES) initiative, SESAR is the mechanism which coordinates and concentrates all EU research and development (R&D) activities in ATM, pooling together a wealth experts to develop the new generation of ATM.

During the recent Digital Transport Days 2019 in Helsinki, INVOLI’s technology for safely integrating drones into the air traffic was introduced to the representatives of the European Commission present for the occasion. INVOLI’s reliable low-altitude air traffic data was used by the partners of the GOF U-space during their unparalleled trials from June through August this year and was further showcased to the attendees of the event.

INVOLI was instrumental in the demonstrations of a safe UTM technology to the gathering in Finland. Their paradigm-shifting approach to UTM provides currently missing air traffic data to drones by following their motto “giving eyes to drones”. By using patented hardware-software system Involi integrates advanced artificial intelligence and space technologies into drone air traffic management systems, hence unlocking the full potential of unmanned vehicles in an integrated environment.

Organized by the European Commission and by Finnish Presidency of the Council of the European Union, the Digital Transport Days 2019 brought together all actors involved in smart transport solutions, offering a European viewpoint to digital solutions for transport and mobility and enabling the industry stakeholders to keep up to date with the latest developments in the field.

It was in this context that GOF U-space presented to the high-level audience the results of their successful demonstrations for the definition of safe and secure drone traffic management. The multiple drones flying during the trials shared the airspace with manned aviation, carried missions over the Gulf of Finland between Finland and Estonia and even transported people, and INVOLI's system was used to enhance the flight awareness by feeding ADS-B and FLARM data directly into FIMS and to contribute to the safety of the operations. On the occasion, GOF U-space partners highlighted the easy integration of INVOLI solution, showcasing the flexibility and interoperability of the GOF architecture.

GOF U-space project, named for the Gulf of Finland stretch of water that divides Finland from Estonia, is a European-led demonstration under SESAR Joint Undertaking and coordinated by Estonian Air Navigation Services, set to define safe and secure drone traffic management. GOF U-space' successfully achieved its goal to establish a pre-operational flight information management system (FIMS) with an architecture capable of integrating existing commercial-off-the-shelf U-space components. Capabilities were demonstrated in different live cases representing the most typical visual line of sight (VLOS) and beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) missions.

“INVOLI’s technology was a great tool for us to enhance the safety of the drone flights within the GOF U-space trials: it was precise, efficient and easy to use” said Jonas Stjernberg, who was in charge with the overall management of the trials within GOF U-space. Manu Lubrano, CEO of INVOLI, added “We are very glad we could support such an amazing deployment of the unmanned aerial systems industry and could prove once again our technology in a fully operational environment. We are of course honored to have been introduced to the European Commission officials present at the Digital Transport Days in Helsinki last week.”

This is another important example of the important work being done in Europe to allow manned and unmanned aircraft to share the airspace and create a safe and efficient controlled environment in the sky.