Airborne telecommunication relay via cost-effective ultra-long endurance UAVs for austere locations

Zenith Aerospace is developing an airborne telecommunication system via its unique solar powered High Altitude Long Endurance (HALE) Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). Running exclusively on solar power, the aerial vehicle is designed to fly at 60,000 feet AGL for 6 months without the need to land. With the development and integration of advanced telecommunication modules with reduced size, weight and power consumption, the unmanned aircraft could carry provide the telecommunication capabiltiy to the units on the ground while staying aloft for weeks and beyond. This results in an cost-effective high bandwidth long distance telecommunication services for austere locations using only the existing telecom technologies like LTE. Based on the current data sheet of the telecom payload that we are investigating, with one system flying at 60,000 feet, we can support hundreds of devices with a connection rate of 1.5 Mbps for each while covering a geographic area over 15,000 km2. Compared to other air-borne/satellite based telecommunication, Zenith’s solution offers a great balance between capabiltiy,cost and scalability which makes it an ideal telecom solutions for the front-deployed units in austere locations.