Geodrones Australia, New Frontier Technologies Secure CRC-P Grant for Aerospace Composite Development

Canberra-based innovative engineering companies Geodrones Australia and New Frontier Technologies, along with the Australian National University, have succeeded in securing a Round 15 Cooperative Research Centres Project (CRC-P) grant valued at ~$3m.

This project will deliver a digital manufacturing platform for carbon composite aerospace structures based on innovative design, automated and additive manufacturing, which has numerous applications in autonomous uncrewed systems. This CRC-P grant will assist Geodrones Australia in developing aerospace components for their bespoke-designed uncrewed systems, which have both Civilian and Defence capabilities.

This grant will allow Geodrones Australia and New Frontier Technologies to collaborate in the design and manufacturing stages, to develop high-precision, high-performance carbon composite rotor blades for Geodrones Australia’s Heavy-Lift LOG UAS. This development will showcase the automated manufacturing process of laser-assisted Automated Fibre Placement technology being utilised for bespoke-designed rotor blades. This will allow Geodrones Australia to digitalise their design and generate a high-fidelity 3D digital twin, which will be used to obtain digital certification.      

Geodrones Australia thanks the Minister for Industry for the confidence to award this grant to our project.