Assam youths develop AI-driven traffic management platform for drones

GUWAHATI: As drones revolutionise military, commercial and other activities, an imperative need for 'traffic management' of these flying objects has emerged with a start-up by two entrepreneurs from Assam providing solutions for it. Already working with the Indian Air Force for detection and counter-measures of drones, the duo has now come out with an intelligent airspace management platform, which was launched at the 'East Tech 2023', a two-day defence expo which concluded on October 11.

"While most companies are making drones, we are focusing on drone airspace management as it's equally important for sustainable growth of the drone ecosystem. Just like automobiles require road traffic management to run safely and efficiently, the same analogy applies for drone airspace," Manash Bhuyan, Managing Director and Co-founder of AVGARDE, told PTI.

Avgarde Systems Pvt Ltd (AVGARDE), co-founded by Manash Bhuyan and Nilutpal Choudhury in 2018, is a startup incubated at IISc Bangalore, and IIT Guwahati. It is a radio frequency and wireless technology-focused deeptech start-up building an AI-driven object sensing platform for low-altitude airspace management. Both founders have relocated from Dubai and Germany respectively to pursue their passions.

It has announced launch of 'DeepSense', a platform addressing complex challenges presented by drones in terms of their operational environment which needs to be managed efficiently and effectively to ensure the safety of aviation, public, operators and other stakeholders.

The platform has various applications across multiple market segments, including airports airspace safety, critical infrastructure protection, drone fleet operations, unmanned traffic management, security monitoring, aerospace and defence, amongst others, they claimed.

Explaining the functioning of the AI-based platform developed by the company, Nilutpal Choudhury, CEO and Co-Founder said, "We have already put in place technologies through which drones can be identified, tackled and their movement inhibited. A 'bird detection and monitoring radar' (BDMR) is also among our products which can prevent 'bird aircraft strike hazard' (BASH) for airport operators and ensure aviation safety."

"Now, we are integrating our modular solutions with the AI-driven airspace management platform, with the vision of establishing an unmanned traffic management system for the drone airspace," he added. The company is working with the Indian Air Force as well as oil and gas companies, incorporating feedback and learnings from both military and civilian use cases to further improve their platform.

"As drone technology further develops, we also have to continuously upgrade the platform at our end. The experience of working with the Indian Air Force provides us with critical insights and helps us improve further," Choudhury added. Bhuyan said that while for the defence sector, the focus is more on anti-drone system, for civilian sectors, protection of critical infrastructure is more vital. "With the proliferation of drones, there is also a convergence with conventional aviation airspace which needs to be managed effectively to avoid collisions, near-misses, delays and disruptions," he added.