TOHUM’s unmanned systems projects experience and knowledge pool strengthens its capabilities to provide a wide range of effective services for public and private sector customers, including aerial mapping, geographical surveys, diagnostics, measurement, maritime surveillance, critical infrastructure security, threat analysis and many other applications. In order to meet the unique needs of its customers, TOHUM offers turnkey solutions with customized designs developed after defining the appropriate air / sea / land platforms, sensors, control systems, operators, training, logistics and similar requirements.

TOHUM is unique in its ability to develop turnkey projects and provide a full range of integrated services to overcome the problems of the relevant countries, public institutions or commercial customers, thanks to its long-standing and productive collaborations with expert engineers, operators, manufacturers, technology providers under the roof of TOHUM or with whom it has project-based stakeholders or solution partnerships in line with agreements.

An ASV can be equipped with sensor systems to detect and classify unauthorized/intruders into a critical infrastructure. It can also be used to patrol a predefined area for extended periods of time. Using high frequency or satellite channels, alerts or other predefined events can be reported back to the relevant security forces. 

ASVs used for this purpose are usually 4-6 m long. The hull can be built as a catamaran or in different forms to meet oceanographic conditions.

Kamikaze drones are a new form of fire-and-forget weaponry. They can be operated using satellite navigation or partially/fully autonomously. Their first successful use has been seen in recent years in conflicts and wars in close geographies. However, electronic warfare (EW) measures are being developed that can be used to disrupt the remote connection. The obvious solution is fully autonomous systems that can operate on their own when the remote operator cannot access them. 

Kamikaze UAVs, after detecting their target, carry out their attack by suicide diving towards the target. Therefore, the required sensor systems are less stringent than other autonomous systems. Depending on the tactical situation, there may be only one sensor and camera required.

The defense systems of surface warships are not symmetrical, so the angle of approach affects the success of an attack. Therefore, a coordinated swarm of autonomous vehicles will be more successful than a single ASV or an uncoordinated swarm attacking randomly without a strategy.

Such systems should use integrated artificial intelligence (AI). This approach requires both platforms and computationally powerful computers to train the algorithms. The formulation of the problem can be reduced so that millions of dollars are not required for training. TOHUM has the necessary expertise in such formulations and applications.

A standard AUV is remotely operated and has propellers as its propulsion system. This makes it noisy and detectable. At TOHUM, underwater gliders are being designed that tend to use buoyancy engines. This helps them to operate for very long periods and ranges. Equipped with passive hydrophones, they can detect and classify intruders in a predefined area. Although the classification capability cannot be as good as an ASV due to the limitations of underwater acoustics, their undetectability gives them an advantage compared to other systems. 

They can patrol designated areas for weeks or months without the need for battery recharging. Furthermore, unlike other solutions that can be affected by weather conditions, AUVs operate safely due to their immunity to weather conditions.

Monitoring an area requires platforms to move in defined zones. If only acoustic signals are required and/or the critical area is a chokepoint, the AUV can stop at the bottom of the seabed and collect the required acoustic signals for extended periods of time. Once the mission is completed, the carrier can return to its base with the data on board. 

In case of a chokepoint, it can wait at the bottom until it detects acoustic signatures that are not classified as friendly. This approach could be used to defend critical infrastructure against special forces and/or detect a wide range of malicious activities, including illegal refugee transportation.

The most widely available unmanned systems are 4-motor systems. These vehicles are limited in terms of operational time, which is usually around 20 minutes. However, they are highly maneuverable and inexpensive. In recent conflicts or wars in various geographies around the world, UAVs have been used to carry small bombs. 

There are new applications of autonomous bomb delivery developed in conflicts in various geographies. This approach is similar to ballistic calculations, where the trajectory of a bomb is calculated to fall in a fully effective manner.

Depending on their construction, FW-UAVs can operate for hours, if not days. As they are fast and robust, they can be used to monitor large areas. UCAVs can be equipped with different sensors such as multi-spectral cameras. These cameras can be used to detect enemy vehicles and/or personnel undetected in daylight.

Recent conflicts and wars around the world have proven that drones are the future of asymmetric warfare. Countermeasures against drone warfare have not been sufficiently developed. This has been proven many times in ongoing conflicts in various geographies. It is claimed that there are various radar systems to detect drones. However, the fact that these systems are not seen enough on the battlefields is a clear sign that such systems are not effective enough. The main reason for this is the low radar cross section (RCS) of drones. They are often buried in clutter. Systems such as multi-barreled serial anti-aircraft guns can be effective in eliminating certain kamikaze UAVs. However, these are vehicles that fly at relatively high altitudes and on predictable trajectories. But quadcopters are immune to these systems. 

One possible solution is to use UAVs to hunt UAVs. A UAV can detect other UAVs more easily due to its altitude. An FW-UAV can continuously monitor a critical area for airborne threats. Moreover, they can carry not only sensors but also the weapons needed to eliminate these threats. The implementation of such systems has not yet been finalized.

In recent years, it has been observed that warships can be successfully attacked and even sunk by using unmanned systems. Even warships, whose main purpose is to provide protection against air attacks, have been subjected to successful attacks. In such attacks, aircraft and missiles were usually used, not naval weapons. Successful attacks have been achieved through the integrated use of fixed-wing drones and anti-ship cruise missiles. This demonstrates the effectiveness of combined arms warfare in drone warfare. The technology is mature enough to develop swarms of autonomous vehicles with different capabilities, i.e. heterogeneous swarms. Once the aforementioned vehicles are developed to operate as a single entity, various heterogeneous swarms can be developed for different missions.

Integrated systems consisting of AUVs and ASVs can be built to work together for the detection of sea mines. ASVs can help with communication and localization when underwater localization is a difficult task and dead reckoning is the main tool, while AUVs can detect sea mines with higher performance.