Issue 40 Unmanned Systems Technology October/November 2021 ANYbotics ANYmal D l AI systems focus l Aquatic Drones Phoenix 5 l Space vehicles insight l Sky Eye Rapier X-25 l FlyingBasket FB3 l GCS focus l AUVSI Xponential 2021

6 Mission-critical info for UST professionals Platform one Qualcomm has developed a chipset specifically for unmanned robotics and aircraft designs (writes Nick Flaherty). Its RB5 platform combines machine learning with a new Tensor accelerator block for local processing, as well as a dedicated computer vision hardware block called EVA (Engine for Video Analytics). EVA provides enhancements for computer vision applications with reduced latencies for real-time image processing with lower power consumption than running the algorithm on a CPU. The chip is designed to operate in harsh industrial conditions, supports a temperature range of -30 C to 105 C and has an option for extended lifecycle support until 2029. It has interfaces for industrial protocols such as EtherCAT and time-sensitive network for robotics applications; it also supports security in multiple layers. The RB5 is based around the Qualcomm Kryo 585 processor running at frequencies of up to 2.84 GHz. This has eight cores, allowing code to be run on the most power-efficient one – a key capability for UAV designs. The processing comes from the Kryo 585 Prime and three Kryo 585 Gold cores, which are a derivative of the ARM Cortex A77. Four Kryo 585 Silver cores are based on the ARM Cortex A55. The chips support LPDDR5 and LPDDR4 memory chips of up to 16 Gbytes. For robotics machine learning applications, the chip includes multiple digital signal accelerators with the Hexagon Tensor accelerator, Hexagon 698 DSP, and Hexagon Vector eXtensions. These act on data from the Spectra 480 dual 14-bit image signal processor that supports a camera with a resolution of up to 200 MP. An Adreno 650 graphics processor unit has 1024 arithmetic units to support OpenGL ES and OpenCL for more graphics processing and displays, rather than being used for machine learning. The chipset combines Qualcomm’s wi- fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.1, and for the Flight version it adds 5G cellular wireless links. A development system is planned for the end of this year. FlightOps in Israel has ported its FlightOS operating system to the chipset for UAV applications beyond visual line of sight. Airborne vehicles Bespoke chips for UAVs October/November 2021 | Unmanned Systems Technology This UAV development system is based around the RB5 chipset