Indian Army, IAF to procure C-UAS with soft-kill capabilities

The Indian Army and the Indian Air Force (IAF) are each procuring 25 units of Big Bang Boom Solutions' long-range Vajra Sentinel C-UAS (pictured). (Big Bang Boom Solutions)

Chennai-based Big Bang Boom Solutions (BBBS) has secured two contracts worth more than INR2 billion (USD24 million) to provide its counter-unmanned aircraft system (C-UAS) to the Indian Army and the Indian Air Force (IAF).

Janes understands that the Indian Army and the IAF will each receive 25 units of BBBS' long-range Vajra Sentinel C-UAS by mid-2025.

In an interview to Janes on 11 March, R Shivaraman, co-founder and chief technology officer (CTO) of BBBS, said the long-range Vajra Sentinel C-UAS has soft-kill capabilities. The system can jam hostile unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) using different techniques, including barrage, spot, and sweep.

“The core part of the [C-UAS] is an artificial intelligence (AI) fingerprint technology that allows the C-UAS to detect low signatures present in the radio frequency (RF) spectrum, enabling the system to detect hostile UAVs at a relatively larger range,” Shivaraman added.

Shivaraman said the long-range Vajra Sentinel C-UAS weighs less than 50 kg and comprises the Vajra Scan-X detector and Vajra Shield-X jammer. The Vajra Scan-X is an RF sensor that can detect UAVs flying at a maximum distance of 15 km and operating at a frequency range of 400 MHz to 6 GHz. The Vajra Shield-X can jam several UAVs simultaneously from a distance of 15 km.

BBBS is currently also demonstrating a short-range, portable C-UAS to the Indian Navy, he added. This C-UAS, named Vajra Shot, is a handheld jammer that can “adapt its interference output frequency using software, effectively neutralising a wide array of standard and non-standard unauthorised UAVs”.