Portuguese dual-use security systems supplier TEKEVER unveiled its improved AR3 EVO uncrewed aerial system (UAS) on the first day of DSEI 2025.
The new platform comprises a range of efficiencies off the back of the existing AR3 model, already in service with the UK Royal Air Force, an electronic attack system known as StormShroud.
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Instead, EVO will see a 50% payload capacity increase, 15% fuel efficiency, a weight reduction of four kilogrammes, as well as a lower radar and acoustic signature. The system has a flight time of 20 and 16 hours when configured as a fixed-wing or vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) variant respectively.
But the main attraction is the design philosophy. In an interview with Airforce Technology, TEKEVER’s chief executive Ricardo Mendes maintained that defence systems need to meet the user’s many, sometimes contradictory, requirements.
This is achieved, he reasoned, by making the whole UAS platform modular. The system is reconfigurable. Different components can be inserted and replaced for different missions, whether the user needs VTOL or fixed-wing, electric power or a heavy-fuel combustion engine. “It’s like Lego really,” Mendes described.
TEKEVER AR3 in Ukraine
Initially a commercial software supplier with strong links with the Home Office, TEKEVER first entered the defence industry after February 2022, the watershed moment when Russia began its full-scale invaison of Ukraine.
In that time, the company learned that the military user is left with certain trade-offs, and in a high intensity warfare environment, like on the frontline, “the customer shouldn’t have to use ten different systems for ten different missions. They should be able to use one system that’s actually a different configuration every time,” Mendes contended.
Usually, when people refer to a system as being very modular, Mendes observed that they mostly consider the payload. Instead, TEKEVER consider four variables: sensors, communications, deployment (so how the platform operates), and propulsion.
“One size does not fit all,” he emphasised, “so we need to fit all sizes on this platform.”
Difficulties in production
With the rise of European rearmament, governments are calling for a sustainable supply of military resources in response to Russian threats.
In its Defence Industrial Strategy, published a few days ago, the UK asserted that the ability to “demonstrate the scalability and resilience of defence industrial production” is a key part of deterrence against potential adversaries.
However, with a fully modular platform like the original AR3 or AR3 EVO, Mendes argued that it is more difficult. “You need to be able to create more flexible production hubs… optimised not for volume or cost only, but factoring in the flexibility that tomorrow you’re producing something different than you are today – and that’s true every few weeks,” he said.
“It’s not about scaling,” he continued, “it’s scaling in an agile way, and it’s very difficult to do.”
This requires a major cultural shift among engineers, production, and infrastructure. Teams must embrace flexibility while be able to constantly learn and change their processes.
“We haven’t cracked it completely – I don’t think anyone has. But we are producing hundreds of systems per year at a relentless pace. If we slowed down agility, we could be producing thousands but that is not what we believe we should do,” Mendes calculated.
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