‘It’s a hen, no it’s a drone’ – Robin Radar can inform the distinction
By DRONELIFE Options Editor Jim Magill
As safety officers everywhere in the world search for methods to assist them shield important infrastructure and mass gatherings of individuals from the potential threats of hostile drones, a Dutch firm is providing an answer for detecting and figuring out small UAVs, based mostly largely on the historic capacity of its methods to identify birds.
Robin Radar lately introduced that the U.S. Division of Homeland Safety (DHS) plans to deploy The Hague-based firm’s IRIS drone-detection radar as a part of DHS’s complete suite of counter-UAS applied sciences designed to guard U.S. cities internet hosting the FIFA World Cup, set to start in June.
“We see ourselves as an necessary constructing block in an general detection system,” Marcel Verdonk, Robin Radar chief business officer, mentioned in an interview with DroneLife. “A sports activities occasion or any massive occasion gives fertile grounds for potential troublemakers who assume that drones are a great way to disturb one thing, or worse case, to stage some terrorist actions.”
The IRIS system, a compact “plug-and-play” radar system, is anticipated to be deployed to fill the gaps at a number of venues the place using extra advanced and costly detection methods wouldn’t be applicable. The system “may be arrange in beneath quarter-hour by a single operator with out technical assist and operates 24/7 seamlessly with minimal human enter,” in keeping with the corporate’s press assertion.
“Not like extra advanced navy methods that require groups of engineers to deploy and function, the IRIS radar integrates seamlessly into broader counter-UAS architectures alongside cameras, acoustic sensors, passive-detection methods and command-and-control platforms.”
The FIFA World Cup occasions are usually not the primary deployment of Robin Radar’s expertise at main worldwide sports activities venues. Verdonk mentioned that French safety forces deployed the corporate’s radars on the Paris Olympic Video games in 2024, the place IRIS was built-in right into a multi-sensor safety framework defending athletes and spectators.
Verdonk mentioned Robin’s methods are adept at detecting small flying objects akin to drones and birds, at comparatively quick distances, about 5 to 10 kilometers (about three to 6 miles). The 15-year-old firm’s first main challenge, launched on the behest of the Dutch Air Pressure, was to design a radar system to detect birds that had been interfering with navy take-offs and landings.
A number of years into the bird-detection tasks, “they discovered we had been additionally fairly good at detecting drones,” he mentioned.
“We then developed the primary devoted drone-detection radar. And now, in 2026 we now have a second-generation of drone-detection radar,” Verdonk mentioned.
The IRIS system makes use of a micro-Doppler expertise that permits it to detect small actions on a flying object, such because the rotations of a drone’s propellers. “We detect that transferring propeller and we will clearly say, ‘Hey, this object, it’s not a hen, nevertheless it’s a drone.’”
Verdonk mentioned DHS chosen Robin as one in all its distributors for counter-UAS expertise after a a number of years-long testing course of. “They did many discipline assessments with our radars and we handed the check they usually picked us as one of many applied sciences that may assist them with this occasion,” he mentioned.
He added that he doesn’t know for sure which World Cup venues would use the Robin expertise, however mentioned he believes that DHS may deploy the tools at websites in Florida and Kansas Metropolis.
“The federal authorities within the U.S. sometimes has a couple of federally permitted reselling corporations, they usually have been tasked by DHS to purchase radars from us. In addition they purchase tools from different corporations they usually convey all of it collectively after which work with DHS to roll it out to the completely different venues,” he mentioned.
IRIS is rated as a Expertise Readiness Stage 9 (TRL 9) system, which means it has been used extensively in energetic battle environments, offering operational validation in high-pressure settings.
The IRIS is designed to offer 360-degree situational consciousness, detecting, monitoring and classifying airborne objects, together with drones intentionally designed to evade conventional detection strategies. “With an instrumented vary of as much as 12 kilometers (about 7.5 miles), IRIS provides early warning, giving authorities the time and house required to evaluate threats, coordinate responses, and act decisively,” the corporate assertion says.
Verdonk mentioned Robin began out offering radar methods to civilian safety businesses and has since broadened its buyer base to incorporate nationwide governmental businesses in North America and in its native Europe.
“Our radar was meant for policing, for prisons, for safeguarding World Cup stadiums and Olympic stadiums and demanding authorities buildings. That’s nonetheless an enormous a part of our enterprise,” he mentioned. Its clients have included the nationwide jail system in The Netherlands and the Dutch Nationwide Police Corps, in addition to police businesses in Germany and the UK.
“In newer years we engaged with our personal authorities and another European governments to offer radars for the Ukraine battle. The Ukrainians have to detect quite a lot of drones each day,” he mentioned.
The struggle in Ukraine has served as warning to governments in Europe in addition to in North America, on the necessity to develop strong counter-UAS capabilities on the nationwide stage, Verdonk mentioned.
“They’re waking up they usually’re realizing that clearly what’s taking place on TV within the Ukraine is simply primarily a drone struggle.”
Learn extra:
Jim Magill is a Houston-based author with nearly a quarter-century of expertise masking technical and financial developments within the oil and fuel trade. After retiring in December 2019 as a senior editor with S&P International Platts, Jim started writing about rising applied sciences, akin to synthetic intelligence, robots and drones, and the methods during which they’re contributing to our society. Along with DroneLife, Jim is a contributor to Forbes.com and his work has appeared within the Houston Chronicle, U.S. Information & World Report, and Unmanned Programs, a publication of the Affiliation for Unmanned Automobile Programs Worldwide.
