AUKUS partners launch Pillar II’s Innovation Challenge on EW

The three AUKUS partners, Australia, the UK and USA, have jointly launched the AUKUS Electronic Warfare Innovation Challenge, the first in a planned series of AUKUS Innovation Challenges. The Australian lead in this Challenge is the Advanced Strategic Capabilities Accelerator (ASCA) alongside the UK’s Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA), and US Defense Innovation Unit (DIU).

This first AUKUS Challenge will seek innovative solutions to shared electronic warfare challenges from industry and research institutions in the three partner countries. It aims to develop a competitive advantage in both targeting and counter-targeting EW. The Challenge Statement seeks innovative, cheap, autonomous capabilities that can be bought in bulk to find, identify, target and engage an adversary using both conventional weapons and the Electro-Magnetic Spectrum (EMS).

Each country will assess winners based on a set of pre-determined criteria aligned to national interests and priorities, with shared access to the best solutions across all three national challenges.

“The release of this Challenge creates an opportunity for Australian defence industry and academia to pitch the very best ideas to a trilateral audience,” says Stephen Moore, First Assistant Secretary for AUKUS Advanced Capabilities.

“The electromagnetic spectrum is an increasingly contested, complex and competitive environment,” said the Director of ASCA, Professor Emily Hilder. “It is exciting that electronic warfare is the first of the AUKUS Innovation Challenges and we look forward to seeing not only what Australian capability is available, but across our AUKUS partners as well.”

Defence says it is looking forward to working with industry and research institutions to deliver cutting-edge capabilities for the ADF while securing a competitive advantage to deter threats to regional security.