Reopening: Making Science Fiction a Reality

Land September 11, 2023

DASA is pleased to reopen this Innovation Focus Area which aims to find novel ideas that will shine a light on the future of Directed Energy Weapons across Land, Sea and Air domains

The Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) is pleased to launch an Innovation Focus Area (IFA) called Making Science Fiction a Reality: Future Directed Energy Weapons. This IFA is seeking innovations that will help contribute to the development of the first generation of deployed Directed Energy Weapons across Land, Sea and Air domains.

This IFA is run on behalf of the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl).

£500k in overall funding is available for this IFA, with £50k-£200k expected to fund each proposal.

Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) are systems capable of discrete target selection that emit laser or Radio Frequency (RF) energy as the primary means to cause disruptive, damaging or destructive effects on equipment or facilities.

The vision of the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) is to make Directed Energy Weapons a realistic choice for our armed forces, which can contribute to a decisive edge and sustain strategic advantage.

This IFA seeks proposals that enhance the performance and/or reduce the size, mass and volume of the system and subsystem areas associated with laser and RF Directed Energy Weapons. For example, innovations that improve:

laser and RF Source technology
system automation
advanced power and cooling technologies that can be ultimately integrated onto military platforms
beam control
target detection
battle damage indication
test and evaluation

For more on the competition scope, read the full IFA document.

DASA Innovation weapons