Brave1 and Sternenko Community develop a unified standard for FPV drone ground control stations

Ukraine has launched a project to standardise ground control stations for FPV drones. The initiative is being implemented by the Brave1 cluster together with the Sternenko Community charitable foundation, Brave1 director Andrii Hrytseniuk said during the Brave1 Advantage event.

According to Hrytseniuk, standardisation will allow different FPV drones to be operated from a single ground station, with only individual antenna modules needing to be changed. This should ensure compatibility between systems.

In April, Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said that the Ministry of Defence was beginning to introduce a universal ground station for fibre-optic drones across Ukraine’s Defence Forces. The project was also overseen by Serhii Sternenko, Fedorov’s adviser on UAV effectiveness.

In response to a request from Defender Media, the Sternenko Community said that the unified ground station for fibre-optic FPV drones is already being used by Ukraine’s leading manufacturers of such systems. TAF Industries is now beginning its transition to the new system, which involves the use of standardised cartridges and a single ground control station for fibre-optic drones. The Sternenko Community said manufacturers are moving to the new standard at their own expense.

Defender Media also asked market participants whether ground stations for unmanned ground vehicles could be standardised. Viktor Dolhopiatov, director of BUREVII Design Bureau, said that the control station is no longer a decisive factor in the cost of an unmanned ground vehicle, as its functions can be performed by a standard laptop with the necessary configuration. Further standardisation would therefore be more practical at the software level.

“We see the universal nature of a control station for UGVs primarily at the software level. The simplest and most effective solution today is to use a standard computer — a laptop, desktop PC or, in the future, a tablet — as a universal workstation,” Dolhopiatov said. As most modern UGVs operate through network technologies, software can provide the required functionality regardless of the specific device.

Defender Media previously reported that UGV deliveries in Ukraine had increased by 650%, while units using ground systems for logistics had seen significant reductions in losses.