Drone swarms with a shared “brain”: Airbus flies MARS AI software at ILA Berlin 2026

The use of autonomous drones, up to and including entire drone swarms, is being advanced by Airbus Defence and Space. At ILA Berlin 2026, several drones worked together autonomously and cooperatively – the first time the company has shown such a demonstration at a European aerospace show. Two Primoco One 150 independently carried out different reconnaissance missions. They were controlled by MARS (Multiplatform Autonomous Reconfigurable and Secure), an AI-based software solution.

In today's drone operations, each platform is monitored by its own operator. Airbus is taking a different approach, giving several uncrewed systems access to a shared, distributed intelligence. The traditional drone pilot thus becomes a mission manager: he or she only defines objectives and rules of engagement, while the software itself handles flight control, task allocation and coordination.

“Imagine a group of drones as a professional football team”— Thomas Schmitt, Programme & Product Manager Crewed-Uncrewed Teaming & Autonomy at Airbus Defence and Space

“We don't have several drones with several brains, but one shared brain that controls several drones. They share the same information. If one drone detects something, the others know it immediately as well. Once they know the rules and the mission, they can do the rest on their own.”— Thomas Schmitt

What MARS does in drone swarms

The tasks of the MARS Autonomy Suite include mission planning, task allocation, automatic target recognition, data fusion, collision avoidance and flight control. Critical decisions, however, are still made by humans, as Schmitt stresses:

“For all critical decisions, the human remains in the decision-making process. The system provides the necessary information and recommendations, but final approval is always given by the operator”— Thomas Schmitt

The software is designed to be platform-independent, so it can be integrated into crewed and uncrewed aircraft alike. The first operational deployments on the Primoco One 150 are already planned for 2026.

In the long term, MARS is to become the backbone of European Uncrewed Collaborative Combat Aircraft (UCCA). Plans include integrating the software from 2029 into the Airbus U740 Valkyrie, which is to fly alongside the Eurofighter. From 2032, the U760 Ravenstorm is then to follow as a fully European, sovereign solution.