Thales and Unifly are joining forces to offer the ECOsystem Unmanned Aerial Systems Traffic Management (UTM) solution. The solution — announced at World ATM Congress 2017 — combines Thales’s expertise in air traffic management, system integration and cyber security with Unifly’s dedicated focus on drone management.

The solution will incorporate Unifly’s Validation Engine, a software application that conducts real-time validation of drone flight plans, into Thales ECOsystem, a decision support platform for improved aviation operations.

At last year’s World ATM Congress, Thales launched the first application of ECOsystem, Air Traffic Flow Management. This second application, UTM, integrates drone registration, pilot registration, flight planning, and regulatory/business rules with geospatial and meteorological information to enable adaptable workflows for managing drone operations as well as customizable situational awareness using tools such as map overlays, terrain views and 3D projections.

The UTM application and data enable automated flight authorizations as well as real-time alerting and intervention in emergency situations. The application will support the growing demand for UAS operations in both Visual Line of Sight and Beyond Visual Line of Sight while ensuring the public’s safety, security and privacy.

Unifly’s validation engine software uses geographically linked data to determine the safety of the intended flight. The Validation Engine is designed to process very large amounts of data. The validation occurs in real-time, both during the flight planning process as well as during the actual flight. Parameters include: position of the drone, airspace, local legislation, no-drone zones, geo-fenced areas, weather, obstacles, roads, as well as other manned and unmanned traffic.