OREANDA-NEWS. The Federal Aviation Administration has selected a small group of companies, including Thales, to support their effort to simplify the process for small UAS operators to comply with current US regulations and safely integrate their operations into the US National Airspace System (NAS).

Key Points

  • FAA selected a small group of supplies to support their effort to simplify the process for small UAS operators.
  • The Thales ECOsystem UTM bridges the gap between safety and security requirements of authorities and operational needs of civil UAS users.
  • The cloud-hosted, cyber-secured3 ECOsystem UTM application applies the rules and workflow defined for the FAA LAANC program to individual planned UAS missions.

Unveiled in 2017, ECOsystem UTM is a flexible platform designed to bridge the gap between the safety and security requirements of national & local authorities and the operational needs of civil UAS users.  The platform provides an automated means for UAS users to validate their mission against relevant regulations and conform to required authorization and notification processes.  In the US, Thales is supporting the incorporation of the FAA Low Altitude Authorization and Notification Capability (LAANC) concepts into the validation and workflow engine of ECOSystem UTM.  The solution is now connected to the FAA’s LAANC infrastructure and ready for validation/testing.

The number of drones is constantly growing and air traffic authorities urgently need solutions to manage their presence in the airspace, the same as any other type of aircraft.  Today’s demonstration highlights Thales’s commitment to the US market and its readiness to support this critical need for the FAA and for ANSPs around the world.
Jean Marc Alias, Thales Vice President for Air Traffic Management

Thales, the world leader in air traffic management demonstrated at the ATCA conference automated flight authorization and notification processes with its advanced ECOsystem2 aviation platform.  The cloud-hosted, cyber-secured3 ECOsystem UTM application applies the rules and workflow defined for the FAA LAANC program to individual planned UAS missions in order to facilitate automated authorization and notification for compliant missions.

LAANC - Low Altitude Authorization and Notification Capability (LAANC) supports air traffic control authorization requirements for UAS operations conducted under the Special Rule for Model Aircraft (part 101e) and the Small UAS Rule (part 107). The current airport notification and airspace authorization processes are manual for the small UAS. LAANC will provide part 101 & 107 UAS operators a streamlined solution to enable real time automated notification and authorization.