Parrot has announced that it will participate in an operational assessment to support an Army production award decision, as part of the final steps of the selection process for the United States Army’s Short Range Reconnaissance drone program.

The company will now begin manufacturing prototypes of its dedicated drone in the U.S. Designed with carefully selected components, Parrot’s mature prototype has been approved for initial manufacturing.

“Parrot is honored to work with the DoD on this highly strategic project,” says Laurent Rouchon, VP Security & Defense at Parrot.

“We have successfully met the high standards set over the last 12 months on the prototype efforts and we look forward to entering this final phase and launching production in the USA.”

Parrot is currently finalizing its U.S. production chain with its partner NEOTech, which specializes in high-reliability programs primarily in the Aerospace and Defense industry, Medical Products, and High-Tech Industrial markets. The plan is to build the final prototype batch for delivery to the U.S. Army and the Defense Innovation Unit in July 2020.

Part of the final prototype assembly process is the installation of all software that was developed by Parrot in Paris; a process that will take place at NEOTech’s facility. This software will ensure high IP protection with no data dissemination. To meet the U.S. Army requirements, Parrot and NEOTech are also working together to achieve the highest quality standard.

Along with five other commercial drone manufacturers, Parrot were selected by the U.S. Army and the Defense Innovation Unit in April 2019 to develop Short Range Reconnaissance prototype drones for military use. Between May and Nov. 2019, Parrot developed a prototype of the drone.

Parrot says that it focused the company’s Paris based research and development efforts toward engineering a drone dedicated to the U.S. Army specifications. A prototype unit was finalized in Nov. 2019, and the initial testing phase continued through January of this year. The company says that initial positive results encouraged it to start exploring the industrialization phase in early 2020.