SILENTIS

Technology · Launcher Core

Drone launcher technology: open where it counts, proprietary where it matters

The Umbra Launcher Core is a drone launcher platform built open — open-source Linux, documented interfaces, and effector-agnostic by design — with a single proprietary layer: the smart core. Open enough to plug into the network you already run; closed only where the hard IP lives.

The smart core is the product you buy. Around it, the operating base and the interfaces are open, and the node takes whichever effector you choose — so you integrate it into the system you run, source the round on the open market, and Silentis keeps only the one layer worth protecting. Every drone launcher in the range — Umbra Counter-UAS, Umbra Strike and Umbra Box, the drone in a box — runs on this one Launcher Core.

The open surface

Open everywhere but the core

Open-source Linux base

The node runs on open-source Linux around the proprietary core — auditable, familiar to integrators, and free of a black-box OS.

Documented interface to a proprietary core

The smart core is the proprietary IP, exposed through an open, documented interface (shared with partners on request) so integrators build to it without lock-in — its capabilities are detailed below.

MOSA-aligned

Designed to the Modular Open Systems Approach — open, documented interfaces so third-party subsystems interoperate — the openness new programmes now require.

Cue-in from any sensor or C2

Takes tracks from the operator's radar, EO/IR, RF or acoustic sensors, or straight from air-defence command-and-control.

Any-sensor, best-effector

Nets in as one engage node in a layered defence — cued from above, handing off after launch — never a closed shooter that forces a rip-and-replace of the C2 the operator already runs.

Effector-agnostic

Configured for the operator's own munition or interceptor, or a matched Silentis drone (Interceptor UAS, FPV Strike UAS, LR Strike UAS); the effector stays a sourced commodity.

The smart core

One core, every build, every host

The Launcher Core is one smart core in many bodies. Strike's UAV launcher or Counter-UAS's tube-launched drone interceptor, man-pack or unmanned submersible, whatever effector the operator sources — it is the same core, reconfigured to the mission each time. That is what product-agnostic means here: the hard capability lives in one place and is carried across the range, so a new form factor is an integration. Six capabilities define it.

01

GNSS-independent launch

Establish an accurate launch solution with no satellite fix — under active jamming and spoofing, the defining condition of the modern battlefield.

02

Autonomous safe-launch under EW

The node runs the full arm–safe–fire sequence itself when the radio environment is contested and the operator may be cut off.

03

Cross-domain effector handoff

Link the effector, hand it off, and let go — netting air, surface and subsea nodes into one layered network.

04

Fibre- or radio-linked control

The node carries the effector's own link — fibre or a jam-resilient, encrypted radio link, straight from the launch point — so the link stays with the launcher: one node to field and protect.

05

Safe salvo

Ripple-fire a salvo from a dense magazine, each round routed to the cell you choose, with deconfliction interlocks and inhibits checked before every launch.

06

Wave-off after launch

The operator keeps arm–safe–abort authority after launch, including wave-off or recommit on effectors that carry the link.

Developer / evaluation programme — register interest. For teams that want to put their own effector behind the Launcher Core: register interest.

Standards

Built to the standards end users check for

Umbra is designed and built to the interoperability standards a NATO or EU programme expects, and its qualification path targets the US and European defence standards that clear a launcher to field.

Silentis holds no certifications today. These are the standards the node is built to interoperate with and the qualification standards its design targets, with conformance completed on the customer's programme, against the controlled documents.

Interoperability — built to, now

Control, cue-in and detection interfaces, built for interoperability:

  • STANAG 4586‑compatible the NATO UAS-control interface, for node tasking, track-reporting and inter-node handoff (node-level, ≥ LOI 3 target).
  • MOSA‑aligned the Modular Open Systems Approach (US 10 U.S.C. §4401), with SOSA and CMOSS as reference architectures.
  • Track cue-in ASTERIX CAT-062/048 and Cursor-on-Target.
  • Counter-UAS sensor fusion the SAPIENT open ICD (STANREC 4869 / BSI Flex 335).
  • Detection interoperability EUROCAE ED-322, the performance and interoperability specification for non-cooperative UAS detection systems.

Qualification & safety — designed to, on the roadmap

The design targets the defence qualification standards that license a launcher to field. Conformance is completed on the customer programme; no certification is held today:

  • Environment & EMC MIL-STD-810H and MIL-STD-461G (US), with their equivalents AECTP-400 and AECTP-500 (NATO).
  • Munitions & launch safety the NATO insensitive-munitions and safety-for-service framework (STANAG 4439 / 4297), HERO (STANAG 4324) and system-safety (STANAG 4452); MIL-STD-2105E / 464D / 882E for US customers.
  • Functional safety & quality IEC 61508 (SIL 3) beneath the safe-launch electronics, and the AQAP-2110 NATO quality-assurance framework.

Sovereignty — by construction

A structural fact of an EU-designed, EU-made node:

  • ITAR‑free designed with no US-origin content.
  • EU‑designed and EU-made the IP and production stay in Europe.
  • EDF-eligible free from control by a non-associated third country.

Open architecture · On request

Umbra Interface Adapter Kit: wire the node into the C2 you already run

The Umbra Interface Adapter Kit is a software-led kit, with an optional small gateway box, that connects an Umbra node to an integrator's sensors and command and control.

It adds no new interface of its own: the kit speaks existing open standards on both sides, taking cues in and exposing the node's control interface, packaged MOSA-aligned, with the gateway box designed to align with the SOSA and CMOSS reference architectures.

Cue in

Ingests the track picture the operator already runs, ASTERIX CAT-062/048 radar tracks and Cursor-on-Target, and hands it to the node as one cue.

Task the node

Exposes the node's control interface, designed to STANAG 4586 (UCS), for tasking, track-reporting and inter-node handoff. Silentis holds no certifications today; conformance is completed on the customer's programme (see standards).

SAPIENT for counter-UAS

A counter-UAS variant speaks the SAPIENT sensor-fusion ICD (BSI Flex 335), so the node is cued by the same radar, RF, EO/IR and acoustic picture as the rest of the defence.

Cues only — never the fire decision

The kit carries cues and tasking. Arm, safe and abort stay inside the Umbra node's safe-launch chain.

Interface documentation, supported message sets and integration detail are shared with qualified integrators and programme teams in a technical briefing — ask about the Adapter Kit.

Briefing

Request a technical briefing

Interface specifications and integration detail are shared with qualified partners in a briefing.

Request a briefing