Defence Firm EDGEFORCE develops ASTRO UGV for Surveillance of Indian Military bases, Defence Factories & Atomic Research Centres
02 Aug 2022 17:49:53
-Jyoti Prakash
Amidst the big push by the Narendra Modi Govt to ban the import of Foreign made drones and promote indigenous manufacture of drones & UGV(Unmanned ground vehicles), a relatively new defence firm based in Telangana, named EDGEFORCE incubated by CDIIC-CODISSIA DEFENCE INNOVATION AND ATAL INCUBATION CENTER (supported by Atal Innovation Mission of NITI AAYOG) have made an Unmanned Ground Vehicle(UGV) based defence solution called ASTRO working to fulfil the vision of Atmanirbhar Bharat.
Amidst the big push by the Narendra Modi Govt to ban the import of Foreign made drones and promote indigenous manufacture of drones & UGV(Unmanned ground vehicles), a relatively new defence firm based in Telangana, named EDGEFORCE incubated by CDIIC-CODISSIA DEFENCE INNOVATION AND ATAL INCUBATION CENTER (supported by Atal Innovation Mission of NITI AAYOG) have made an Unmanned Ground Vehicle(UGV) based defence solution called ASTRO working to fulfil the vision of Atmanirbhar Bharat.
ASTRO or (Autonomous Surveillance and Tracking Rover) is an Unmanned ground vehicle capable of performing indoor and outdoor mapping which can be used for performing Surveillance on precious govt factories like OFB, Atomic research centers as well as military bases.
ASTRO is equipped with a telescopic mast with the ability to attach payloads like Doppler Radar (in house with 2km range), Motion & thermal sensors, Visual Payload with LRF, Jet Gun etc. based on the user requirement.
Quoting One of the makers of ASTRO UGV, Ramachandran Andayil, in an exclusive to Newsbharati, “We have our indigenously developed ASTRO (Autonomous Surveillance and Tracking Rover) which works on teleoperated and autonomous mode for performing land-based Surveillance for the Armed forces.”
Such features in a UGV minimizes threats to lives of Soldiers operating in highly volatile areas susceptible to intrusions by terrorists bolstering security of the area its deployed in.
The UGV ASTRO also features a futuristic Obstacle detection System & can immediately take Collision avoidance measures both in teleoperated & autonomous mode and chart a path and go around the obstacle.
Ramachandran further cited the relatively less timespan of development of UGV ASTRO which is only 2 months.
UGV ASTRO is developed by Colonel P Hani, SM (R), Indian army veteran who has served Indian army for 25 years & Ramachandran Andayil, a defense technologist.
The company Edgeforce is founded by two Indian Army Veterans namely, Colonel P Hani SM(R) & Colonel (Dr) N Sriramesh, SM (R) who have earlier worked extensively as experts in Artificial Intelligence Projects for Indian army & making of Arjun Main Battle Tank respectively.
Currently, Edgeforce is working on developing a bigger UGV in collaboration with Advanced Systek.
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Jyotiprakash is an Analyst on Internal security and Defense related issues & writes passionately about Indian Defense capabilities & made in India Defense equipment