UK's NPSA Seeks Industry Partners to Develop More Effective Counter-Drone Technology

UK's NPSA Seeks Industry Partners to Develop More Effective Counter-Drone Technology

The UK's National Protective Security Authority (NPSA), in collaboration with the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), has issued a formal call for vendors and organisations interested in participating in the next edition of the Capability Optimisation Research Environment (CORE) event. The event is scheduled to take place in the United Kingdom from 19 to 23 October 2026.

What Is the CORE Event?

In its official statement, NPSA described the initiative as follows: "CORE provides a collaborative test and experimentation environment designed for organisations developing counter-unmanned aircraft systems (C-UAS) technologies. It enables participants to research, trial, and refine capabilities alongside UK Government and international partners."

2026 Focus Challenge

For this year's event, NPSA is specifically seeking technology solutions that help mobile security teams detect, track, identify, locate, and respond to drone activity more effectively — without reliance on fixed infrastructure or large static counter-drone systems.

NPSA noted that temporary event venues, crowded locations, public spaces, distributed properties, light-infrastructure sites, and mobile operational environments are often protected by security guards, patrol personnel, and ad hoc security teams.

"The core question is: can emerging technologies make these personnel more effective when dealing with the potential risks and threats posed by unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs)?" NPSA stated. The 2026 CORE challenge will explore how to integrate security personnel, portable sensors, wearable devices, rapidly deployable nodes, existing resources, and novel operating interfaces into a distributed drone sensing, locating, alerting, and decision-support network.

Technologies Being Sought

NPSA emphasised that it is not looking for a single type of technology, but is open to any technology or concept that helps frontline security teams more effectively detect, locate, understand, communicate, and respond to drone activity. Areas of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Portable, wearable, or rapidly deployable sensors
• Exploitation and repurposing of existing device sensors (including IMU, cameras, microphones, GNSS, compass, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and similar capabilities)
• Mesh networking and peer-to-peer situational awareness
• Distributed detection and collaborative geolocation
• Augmented reality (AR), haptic feedback, audio cues, or other novel operating interfaces
• AI-assisted classification, alerting, and decision support
• Integration with command-and-control systems
• Privacy-preserving and cyber-secure portable technologies
• Rapidly deployable systems suited to temporary or light-infrastructure sites

Core Concept

NPSA outlined the central philosophy behind the 2026 challenge: distributed security teams working in conjunction with devices, sensors, and temporary nodes to achieve broader coverage, more accurate localisation, faster reporting, improved situational awareness, and more effective response capabilities.

How to Participate

Interested vendors are invited to submit an expression of interest briefly describing the proposed solution and its relevance to the 2026 CORE event. Submissions must be sent to Core2026@npsa.gov.uk by Monday, 6 July 2026.

For further information, visit the NPSA official blog: Expression of Interest: CORE 2026 – C-UAS Force Multiplier

Image credit: NPSA

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