Old military trucks to go autonomous with ARX’s firestick-like platform
ARX Robotics’ latest launch, Mithra OS, is based on an AI-driven operating system and comes with hardware cameras and sensors that can be mounted on military trucks.
Munich-based tech startup ARX Robotics, whose founders are veterans of the German armed forces, has unveiled a new product, named Mithra OS, that turns military vehicles into intelligent, interconnected autonomous units.
The company initially launched with Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGV) and subsequently secured a major German military government contract, specifically for deployment in Ukraine. In June of this year, the startup raised a $9.5 million (€9 million) seed funding round led by the NATO Innovation Fund, with support from Project A Ventures and Discovery Ventures.
Making military trucks intelligent
ARX’s latest product has an operating system based on AI. The Mithra OS comes with hardware cameras and sensors that can be mounted on military trucks or similar vehicles, and includes over-the-air updates through the ARX Autonomy Kit, TechCrunch reports.
According to Marc Wietfeld, founder and CEO of ARX Robotics, while the “battlefield of the future is digital,” European and other Western armies are still acquiring analog systems with no connection to modern battlefield environments.
“The thing is, we discovered the problem when being in the front line in Ukraine—but especially with the NATO armed forces—that the new assets of warfare such as drones, sensors, software, AI, etc cannot interconnect or collaborate with our existing fleets,” he told TechCrunch.
For instance, Wietfeld mentioned that the German armed forces purchased 3,500 Mercedes trucks but none of them are software capable, interconnected, or equipped with a radio—highlighting the gap between modern battlefield needs and current military procurement.