Lithuanian drone manufacturer RSI Europe has a simple motto: Help Ukraine win
RSI Europe is a Lithuanian drone manufacturer that has delivered products to Kyiv.
The company was founded in the wake of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
BI spoke to RSI's CEO about the company, its products, and Ukraine.
Lithuanian drone manufacturer RSI Europe was founded after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Tomas Milašauskas, the CEO and cofounder of RSI Europe, told Business Insider that the company was born out of fear of what a Ukrainian defeat could mean for Europe's future security.
Like its neighbor Poland, the Baltic state of Lithuania shares a border with Russia's ally Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, making it particularly wary of Moscow's threat.
"Our mission is very simple," Milašauskas said. "To produce the military equipment that helps Ukraine win."
The company initially focused on developing remote explosives initiation systems designed in close collaboration with Lithuanian military engineers.
However, the widespread use of uncrewed aerial vehicles in the Russia-Ukraine war soon saw RSI move into the world of FPV (first-person-view) drones.
FPV drones have played a major role in the conflict in Ukraine, often proving cheaper and more accurate than most artillery and still allowing operators to strike targets at a distance.
RSI's main products now include RISE-1, a remote explosives initiation system, and Shpak, an FPV quadcopter that carries a payload of up to 5 kg (around 11 pounds).
The Shpak drone is designed to carry out precision strikes on enemy targets using explosive munitions, the company says. It is optimized to carry a 2 kg (around 4.4 pounds) payload over a 20 km (roughly 12.4 miles) range, it adds.
RSI reportedly delivered its first batch of Shpak drones to Ukraine in October.
A major obstacle facing drone crews in Ukraine is the use of electronic warfare systems — the Achilles' heel of FPVs — which use the electromagnetic spectrum to disrupt GPS and video signals.
In June last year, French Army Chief of Staff Gen. Pierre Schill warned that small drones could lose their combat advantage in Ukraine as such defenses continued to be developed, saying that the "impunity" of small, simple drones on the battlefield was "a snapshot in time."
But as these countermeasures have advanced, drone makers have adapted.
While some have tapped into artificial intelligence to beat such systems, RSI's drones are fitted with fiber-optic guidance systems and can use frequency-hopping and non-standard video frequencies to help resist EW defenses.
Moving forward, the company is banking on FPVs becoming even more prominent in warfare.
"The Russian invasion of Ukraine has brought FPV drones to prominence as a component of modern militaries and it appears that they are here to stay," Milašauskas and Liudvikas Jaškūnas, an analyst at RSI, wrote for the Atlantic Council in June.
Kyiv, too, has signaled its belief that drones are the future.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in February 2024 that Ukraine was launching a separate branch of its armed forces — the Unmanned Systems Forces — dedicated solely to drones.
Its Ministry of Defense also recently announced that the Ukrainian armed forces would receive an additional UAH 2.5 billion (around $60 million) a month to procure new drones, in a move designed to allow brigades to purchase the equipment they need directly.
Ukrainian defense minister Rustem Umerov said the move marked "another step towards building a highly flexible system to ensure the military has everything necessary for Ukraine's defense."
Read the original article on Business Insider
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