Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
Northrop Grumman and Merlin Partner on Autonomous Flight
Merlin is one of six autonomy specialists joining Northrop’s Beacon Project
Scaled Composites Model 437 Vanguard aircraft
The Beacon testbed ecosystem will use a Scaled Composites Model 437 Vanguard aircraft to demonstrate autonomous flight solutions for the U.S. military. © Northrop Grumman

Northrop Grumman has partnered with autonomous flight pioneer Merlin to integrate the highly automated Merlin Pilot flight control system into its Beacon testbed ecosystem, which will use a Scaled Composites Model 437 Vanguard demonstration aircraft to test and demonstrate autonomous flight solutions for defense applications. The partners intend to conduct a series of flight demonstrations later this year.

Merlin is one of six companies that Northrop Grumman selected to participate in the Beacon project. Other program partners include Silicon Valley self-driving car start-up Applied Intuition, Avidyne spinoff Autonodyne, augmented-reality specialist Red 6, drone developer Shield AI, and SoarTech, an Accelint subsidiary specializing in artificial intelligence (AI) solutions for various military technologies. 

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