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The Flaris Sinyar-LAR3P high-speed uncrewed air vehicle will be Edge Group’s first jet-propelled design to take flight.
After spending its formative years on an acquisition spree and defining its product strategy, Edge Group is turning its attention to churning out military equipment.
The state-owned United Arab Emirates defense contractor has been working across a range of systems, from uncrewed ground vehicles to aircraft. While many of these systems are still in development, building them has become more central to the Edge Group’s activities.
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“We are absolutely spending most of our time on scale,” says Khaled Al Zaabi, Edge’s president of platforms and systems. “I think what you would see as a major difference between today and five years from today is the volume of products being fielded.”
The company is investing in hundreds of thousands of square meters of production capacity. The goal is not just to produce a few items but to reach large volumes. “Over the next two years, you’ll see that ramp up and scale go dramatically higher,” Al Zaabi said. “It’s mostly about the industrialization of having a high rate of production and everything that entails—from a supply chain to manpower facilities. So that’s all being put in place today.”
To help underpin Edge’s mandate to give the UAE a degree of autonomy in military equipment, the company in February formally unveiled its push into propulsion systems. Its subsidiary Powertech is working on engines to power everything from missiles to medium-size uncrewed aircraft.
Powertech began running a new missile engine several weeks ago that it designed and built in-house; Al Zaabi called the event “a major milestone.” The engine should find applications across a range of Edge products, he said, such as loitering munitions, missiles and drones.
That assured in-house route to market should help overcome some of the barriers that other engine startups face. “If I was an independent startup propulsion company that wanted to do this, I would not have secured offtakes even if I developed the engine because any OEM that designs platforms would want to have an engine that is mature,” Al Zaabi said. “I’m able to secure revenue and pipeline for the engines right from the beginning, and that actually enables you to have a business case right from the get-go.”
At one point, the company was looking for strategic industrial partners to collaborate on some co-development efforts, but no longer. “We decided we will do it all ourselves,” Al Zaabi said, noting that such a push comes with considerable financial commitment.
Edge has been scaling up staff in recent months, putting in place the tooling for production and building up its test capacity. “We’re currently putting in groundwork for industrialization of high-rate volume production that will start pumping out engines in the next 10-12 months,” Al Zaabi added.
One of the challenges for the UAE is its relatively small domestic labor pool, so Powertech is prioritizing production automation and robotics, that require little to no human intervention aside from assembly. That capital-intensive but not labor-intensive manufacturing approach also helps make the business more competitive, Al Zaabi argues.
To build up its manufacturing capability, Powertech has been leaning on sister unit EPI, which specializes in machined aerospace parts and precision engineering. EPI supplies platform makers such as Airbus and Boeing.
Powertech is also ramping up production of its 145-hp, six-cylinder engine after selecting the system for one of the uncrewed systems being built by sister unit Adasi. The engine, formally launched this year, is now running in tests.
Despite the surging global demand for solid-rocket motors to power missiles and rockets, Al Zaabi said Powertech would not pursue that business line but would remain focused on air-breathing designs.
Another area in which the company is increasing its focus on production as Edge expands its portfolio is uncrewed air vehicles. The Flaris Sinyar-LAR3P high-speed uncrewed air vehicle, the company’s first jet-propelled design, is due to fly in a few months.
Al Zaabi also suggested that the company is advancing work on its Jeniah uncrewed combat aerial vehicle (UCAV). The stealthy-looking UCAV, featuring a 6.5-m (21.3-ft.) wingspan and length of 10.5 m, is expected to fly in a few years. The UAE has decided to classify the program, however, so details are closely guarded; Al Zaabi compares this level of secrecy with that of the U.S. around the Boeing F-47 future fighter.
Al Zaabi said Edge’s strategy also extends beyond drone development and manufacturing. Conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have demonstrated the need to adapt technology, he noted, so Edge is evolving its platforms, upgrading them with new sensors and machine-learning algorithms to enhance their effectiveness.
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