New Military Robots to Face Off in Two Summer Contests

• robotics
• military
• tech watch
• DARPA

It could be a rule of modern urban warfare: Send the robot in first. After all, it’s better to risk an unmanned air or ground vehicle than an infantry squad. While the United States has already deployed thousands of robots in Iraq and Afghanistan, its allies are lagging behind. Following the lead of DARPA’s high-profile Grand Challenge and Urban Challenge, both Singapore and the United Kingdom are staging robotics competitions this August to develop their own autonomous war machines.

In the U.K.’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) Grand Challenge, scheduled for mid-August, 14 teams will send unmanned systems through the Copehill Down training village in southwestern England. Their mission is to locate improvised explosive devices, snipers, weaponized 4x4 trucks and armed troops. The robots range from flying saucers and mini helicopters to modified remote-control toy cars. Most teams will rely on swarms of robots rather than on solo machines—Stellar Team’s Saturn system includes a small unmanned ground vehicle and two unmanned aerial vehicles, while Mindsheet plans to deploy a fleet of up to five toy-size ground robots.

The goal of Singapore’s TechX Challenge isn’t a robot scout, but a full-fledged soldier. “Singapore is a small country with limited manpower and resources,” says Philip Chan, research director for the nation’s Defence Science and Technology Agency. “We need to leverage technology.” A half-dozen ground robots will attempt to climb stairs, operate elevators and navigate hallways without human assistance. The winner of the Singapore contest will get $1 million. The MOD Grand Challenge is only awarding trophies, but the real payoff could be bigger—officials say that any team with a capable system could land a government contract on the spot.

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