European Defense Firms Push AI Integration in Drone Navigation and Targeting

Inspired by the operational success of Ukraine’s unmanned systems, European drone manufacturers are accelerating efforts to integrate artificial intelligence into navigation, targeting, and autonomy.

A key example of this evolution was Ukraine’s covert “Spider Web” drone operation on June 1, which penetrated deep into Russian territory. While much of the focus centered on the drones’ destructive reach, analysts now highlight AI as a quiet force multiplier behind the mission.

According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), AI-enabled tools likely played a critical role in the operation—training FPV (first-person view) drones to identify threats, assess optimal strike points, and continue navigating even in the event of operator disconnection.

AI on the Frontlines: From Latvia to Finland

This fusion of AI and unmanned systems is fast becoming a trend across Europe. At the recent Drone Summit in Estonia, several Latvian firms showcased new systems with onboard targeting intelligence. Among them, Origin Robotics debuted “Blaze”—an autonomous interceptor drone trained using AI to distinguish between aircraft and engage aerial threats. Once locked onto a target, Blaze launches and intercepts using a kinetic strike.

Meanwhile, Finnish defense giant Patria is leading a pan-European consortium on the AI-WASP project (Artificial Intelligence Warfare Adaptive Swarm Platform). Backed by €45 million in European Commission funding, the initiative aims to develop AI-based mission control for swarms of unmanned and optionally manned vehicles. Partner nations include Finland, Sweden, Estonia, Italy, Greece, and Spain.

Real-World Deployments and Navigation Breakthroughs

In the Czech Republic, LPP Holding announced earlier this year that it has supplied AI-guided MTS drones to Ukrainian forces. Designed for GPS-denied environments, these systems leverage visual navigation powered by onboard AI, enabling autonomous flight where satellite guidance is unavailable or jammed.

Germany’s Quantum Systems also entered the spotlight with its Mosaic UXS platform. This modular software ecosystem coordinates drones across land, sea, and air, featuring machine learning-based mission planning, swarm operations, and autonomous tasking of individual drones within a larger operation.

The Data Challenge

Despite progress, experts caution that AI integration still faces challenges—particularly around data dependency and onboard decision-making.

“The core issue is training data,” explains Samuel Bendett, advisor at the Center for Naval Analyses. “For drones to operate autonomously, especially in targeting, all critical data must reside onboard. That’s a serious hurdle in dynamic battle conditions.”

Ukraine, according to CSIS, is addressing this through the development of compact AI models trained on narrow datasets. These models run on lightweight, cost-effective chips and are retrained using either operational feedback or open-source data, such as publicly available imagery and social media footage.

Toward Next-Gen Autonomy

The momentum is clear: Europe’s defense industry is pivoting rapidly toward AI-enabled autonomous systems. From counter-drone interceptors to battlefield swarm coordination, the integration of onboard intelligence is shaping the next generation of drone warfare.

For Ukrainian and European innovators alike, the future of unmanned systems lies not just in flight range or payload—but in the ability to think.