- Airbus said its Bird of Prey counter-drone interceptor completed its first demonstration flight in northern Germany, where it autonomously detected and engaged a simulated one-way attack drone
- The reusable system, equipped with Mark I fire-and-forget interceptor missiles, is being developed for NATO-integrated layered air defense with a target operational date of early 2027
Airbus said Monday that its Bird of Prey counter-drone interceptor completed its first demonstration flight at a military training area in northern Germany.
The test used a Mark I air-to-air missile developed by defense startup Frankenburg Technologies, marking the first public demonstration of the system in a realistic military scenario.
Airbus said the demonstration was carried out under realistic mission conditions, during which the unmanned interceptor searched for, detected, and classified a target drone autonomously before engaging it after operator authorization.
The Bird of Prey is designed as a counter-unmanned aerial system (C-UAS) platform intended to neutralize multiple medium-sized one-way attack drones during a single mission at a comparatively low interception cost. Marta Nogueira, head of business at Airbus Defence and Space Spain, said the system is specifically aimed at defeating medium-sized kamikaze drones and is not optimized for very small multicopter threats.
The company said the interceptor performs autonomous search, detection, and classification, while weapons release remains under human operator control. That human-in-the-loop approach is operationally relevant because it combines autonomous target acquisition with controlled engagement authority, a model increasingly favored in modern counter-UAS systems.
The demonstration flight took place nine months after the project began, reflecting a compressed development cycle. The prototype used during the flight is based on a modified Airbus Do-DT25 drone, with a 2.5-meter wingspan, 3.1-meter length, and a maximum takeoff weight of 160 kilograms.
Although the prototype carried four Mark I missiles, Airbus said the operational version is expected to carry up to eight. The Mark I is described as a high-speed subsonic fire-and-forget interceptor missile with a range of up to 1.5 kilometers. Each missile measures 65 centimeters in length and weighs less than 2 kilograms, making it one of the lightest guided interceptor missiles currently developed for this role.
The missile is fitted with a fragmentation warhead designed for short-range aerial target neutralization. This allows the reusable Bird of Prey platform to engage several incoming drones during a single sortie, directly addressing one of the main challenges in current air defense operations: the need to defeat large numbers of low-cost attack drones without expending expensive surface-to-air missiles.
Airbus said the system is designed to operate within NATO’s integrated layered air defense architecture, allowing it to serve as a mobile complement to existing missile and radar networks. The company described it as a highly mobile and essential component that can be integrated into layered air and missile defense solutions.
As conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have shown, traditional air defense missiles can be disproportionately expensive when used against low-cost one-way attack drones.
Airbus said it plans to conduct additional test flights throughout 2026 to further mature the system and demonstrate its capabilities to prospective customers. According to Nogueira, the company aims to make the Bird of Prey operational by early 2027, subject to customer requirements and integration into specific concepts of operations.
Airbus Defence and Space CEO Mike Schoellhorn said defense against kamikaze drones has become an urgent tactical priority in the current geopolitical and military environment. He said the Bird of Prey and the low-cost Mark I missile are intended to close a critical capability gap in asymmetric conflict scenarios.
Frankenburg Technologies CEO Kusti Salm said the demonstration represents the first integration of a new class of mass-producible, low-cost interceptor missiles on a drone platform. He added that the system is designed to reshape the cost curve of air defense by enabling protection against mass aerial threats at a fundamentally different scale.