Performed in waters off the south coast of England over a two-week period in November, the activity showcased the Herne XLAUV in an operational ‘vignette’ designed to demonstrate an intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) mission. Representatives from 10 nations – including both NATO and Five Eyes partners – were invited to observe.
Herne is a BAE Systems-funded engineering development effort designed to address emerging demand for an ‘attritable’ XLAUV capability able to contribute to a variety of missions, including ISR, anti-submarine warfare (ASW), electronic warfare (EW), and protection of critical national infrastructure (CNI). The company is leveraging commercial off-the-shelf platform technology through a partnership with Canadian marine technology company Cellula Robotics.
Herne in its current form represents an amalgam of Cellula Robotics’ 12 m Solus-XR modular free-flooding AUV; BAE Systems’ own Nautomate autonomous control software; a flexible ‘sense, decide and effect’ payload integration engineered through mission-specific plug-ins; and system-level assurance – for example IT security and military communications – to enable use in military applications.
“Cellular is providing our baseline platform,” said Tim O’Neill, BAE Systems Maritime Services’ business development manager. “What we are then doing is taking our Nautomate ‘brain in a box’ and putting it into the underwater domain. Nautomate is the core control architecture that drives into the platform…it manages what the platform is doing based on sensing and charting.”
It was at DSEI 2023 that BAE Systems set the target of having a technology demonstrator in the water before the end of this year. “Engineering work on Herne started in September 2023 between us and Cellula,” said Nick Martin, BAE Systems’ Herne project manager. “The first dive [of the vehicle] was at the end of July 2024 [in British Columbia]. So that was ‘whiteboard to water’ in just 11 months.”
He added: “What we saw [with Cellula] was a really agile and flexible company that was very quick in moving to market. It brought all the advantages of a commercial business which we could marry with our military knowledge.”
The 3,000 m depth-rated Solus-XR vehicle provides for up to 5,000 litres of payload space, split equally between payload modules fore and aft. Payload bays lift out as a single unit – removal requires the removal of just four bolts and detachment of two data connectors – with swap-out taking less than 90 minutes.
The Herne demonstrator vehicle is currently configured with Lithium-ion batteries, which offer an endurance of a few days’ endurance. For longer endurance missions, BAE Systems is looking to take advantage of Cellula Robotics’ ongoing work to mature hydrogen fuel cell technology. This would provide for a submerged range of around 5,000 km at 3 knots.
The ISR mission vignette performed during the recent demonstrations required Herne to conduct a covert sub-surface harbour entry; navigate autonomously; collect video via a raised sensor mast and identify a hostile target; and then share ISR data when safe.
Three software plug-ins were demonstrated during the course of the ISR vignette: goal-based mission autonomy (enabling Herne to autonomously re-route to avoid a number of drag net hazards); machine vision (processing high definition camera imagery to classify ships by type); and track-and-follow (exploiting the camera feed to shadow a rigid inflatable boat ‘target’).
“These demonstrations have sought to showcase where the company has invested, and focused effort,” said O’Neill. “They have also served as a check that we’re going in the same direction as our customers.”
Further development and demonstration activity is planned in the months ahead. “We’re sitting down with Cellula now to explore a number of threads going forward,” O’Neil said. “That will include iterations to the platform, looking at any changes with regard to power, propulsion, speed, efficiency and signature.
“That said, what Cellula have got – the strongback design, the modularity and the flexibility – is still going to be the core. What we will be doing is layering on top of that.”
Work to further develop Nautomate will continue in parallel: for example, building additional mission-based plug-ins, and evolving the ‘intelligence’ in the system. BAE Systems will also evaluate overall ‘useability’ aspects such as launch and recovery, in-service maintenance, and through-life support.
As regards payloads, definition work has already started for an ASW package. “We want to have thin-line passive towed array that is reelable within the platform,” O’Neill said. “The other ASW piece I’d like to try out is setting up Herne within a multistatic ASW environment [although] that is a bigger challenge because of the need to time-stamp data and get that transmitted back to the hub.”
As regards EW, Herne could provide a covert, forward deployed capability for signal interception. Another option would be to add in an active payload able to conduct deception, jamming or spoofing.
The contribution that an XLAUV could make to seabed warfare isalso being considered, according to O’Neill. “Cellula have already done some work deploying a remotely operated vehicle from Herne. We’d like to revisit that to understand how that could support [CNI] investigation and protection at depth.”
BAE Systems is aiming to have an initial instantiation of the Herne XLAUV ready for market by mid-2026.
“In 18 months time we want to be able to offer this as an operational battle-ready configuration,. That will include the option for hydrogen fuel cells. We’re trying to be proactive so that when navies are more confident of their needs, and their concepts of operation, we are ready to respond. And by adapting an existing off-the-shelf [vehicle] platform we can significantly reduce the time and cost to market.”
Tim O’Neill, BAE Systems Maritime Services’ Business Development Manager
