UK funds PYRAMID open avionics push for drones, swarms and GCAP

The UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) is set to widen its adoption of open avionics architecture, with UK Defence Innovation (UKDI) awarding more than £2 million to four companies that will build the PYRAMID standard into uncrewed aircraft and mission systems.  

Announced on June 25, 2026, the Phase 2 competition was run on behalf of the Royal Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office. It follows an earlier round credited by the MOD with expanding the pool of suppliers offering PYRAMID-compliant products. 

What PYRAMID is for 

PYRAMID is a UK MOD initiative to develop modular avionics and mission systems built on a common open reference architecture, known as the PYRAMID Reference Architecture (PRA).  

The goal is to make software reusable across platforms and thus reduce the time and cost of adding capabilities across an aircraft’s service life, covering both new designs and legacy fleets. Open architecture of this kind is intended to limit reliance on a single supplier, enabling operators to integrate subsystems from different vendors. 

Four winners, four use cases 

Barnard Microsystems will apply the PRA to its all-electric AWAE-24 uncrewed aerial vehicle, with the aim of operating the drones individually or in groups, carrying the work over to longer-range and higher-speed designs.  

FLYBY Technology, founded by former fighter pilot weapons instructor Jon Parker, has announced that it is targeting the first use of the PYRAMID Reference Architecture on a flying combat platform. 

Auterion, working with Frazer-Nash Consultancy, will develop PYRAMID-compliant upgrades to Nemyx, its swarm autonomy platform, to show how the architecture can support swarming uncrewed systems. 

Transatlantic interoperability 

Applied Intuition UK plans to demonstrate an airborne targeting chain compliant with both PYRAMID and the US FACE (Future Airborne Capability Environment) standard, the US open avionics software framework.  

The company noted that the dual compliance is aimed at future UK-US interoperability, positioning it as a supplier for programs including the Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), the UK-Italy-Japan effort to field a sixth-generation fighter by 2035. 

Mike Lane, PYRAMID lead at the RAF Rapid Capabilities Office, said that Phase 1 had attracted UK and international partners and increased the number of suppliers delivering compliant products, describing UKDI’s contribution as “a real asset to UK defence”.  

The agency has said that it will keep advertising PYRAMID and related funding opportunities as the work continues.The post UK funds PYRAMID open avionics push for drones, swarms and GCAP appeared first on AeroTime.

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