The drone industry sees itself upended by the war.
French Startup Tackles Russian Defenses in Ukraine
In late May, Hadrien Canter, founder of the startup Alta Ares, spent ten days in Kyiv. It was a whirlwind trip during which he participated in a “hackathon” organized by the Ukrainian army. “For seventy-two hours, developers had to work on thirty specific subjects defined by the military. It was intense,” says the head of this French company, founded in Ukraine in 2023, which has just raised 2 million euros from several investment funds.
The object of this brainstorming: to thwart new Russian defense systems. A challenge that Alta Ares, a specialist in software designed to analyze, using artificial intelligence (AI), the flow of images transmitted in flight in order to detect enemy positions, is striving to meet. “Beyond the respect we have for the Ukrainian cause, it is clear that today, a company that has ambitions in the field of drones must be present in this country,” insists Hadrien Canter.
Since the beginning of the Russian invasion in February 2022, a new type of armed conflict dominated by technological issues has placed remotely piloted aircraft at the heart of the war. Faced with more numerous and heavily equipped Russian forces, Ukraine, lacking a sufficient number of missiles, has massively used drones to protect its territory and carry out offensive actions. Largely financed by international aid, this unprecedented investment has shifted the center of gravity of the global drone industry.
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