France Buys AeroVironment Mini Drones for €5.6M

WaspAE

Under a contract that has been “negotiated without prior publication of a contract notice”, as the works / products / services can only be “supplied by a specific tenderer for technical reasons”, French procurement agency the DGA, has awarded the US company AeroVironment a contract worth EUR 5 639 135 on January 3rd, 2017.

The contract, No. 2016 93 0008 (read here ), is entitled “UAVs Acquisition DRAACO and associated services.

No details on the type of drones, on the meaning of “DRAACO” or on the amount of equipment and services purchased. When questioned, the DGA replied: “DRAACO consists in acquiring a few mini-drones systems in addition to the existing systems and awaiting the arrival of the SMDR drones” (end of quotation and answer).

This is not the first purchase of drones from the US company that provides among other UAVs like Raven and Puma . For example, in November 2009 the DGA awarded AeroVironment a contract for the supply of Wasp in favour of FS.

Does this mean that the mini-drones purchased are of this type?

Source: Ouest France

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