Bloomberg summarizes the criticism of Helsing drones: overpriced and announce contracts prematurely

Helsing, a German startup and one of Germany’s top drone companies, has been criticized for its overpriced and premature announcements.

Bloomberg reported on this after analyzing the situation in this regard.

The main criticism of the company was the cost of the HF-1, which is a markup by Helsing, and, according to Ukrainian military officer Oleksandr Karpiuk, is an incredible EUR 16,700, which is too much for a drone made of plywood.

At the same time, he noted that the price of a similar drone, according to him, is no more than EUR 2,200, and this causes some indignation. Also, according to the newspaper, two other people associated with these drones shared that the company charges a lot of money because of the use of special software.

The media contacted Francisco Serra-Martins, the Australian founder and CEO of Terminal Autonomy, a Helsing partner, because his company’s website posted an ad for the sale of HF-1 drones, which cost up to EUR 1800 without Helsing’s software installed.

Despite the request, he refused to comment on the price, and Simon Brunieres of Helsing also refused to comment on the price, saying that the criticism from the military was unfounded and that the cost of the drone did not reach such prices.

In addition to the cost itself, the company’s software was criticized, which, according to the Ukrainian military, is too expensive and less efficient than that used on much cheaper drones.

“Helsing’s pricing has been recognized as meeting the standards set by the German and Ukrainian ministries of defense, despite the fact that frontline drones with Helsing software have destroyed up to 20 times more equipment than their original cost,” Brunier said.

Despite this, Maksym Sheremet, founder of Dronarnia, a Kyiv-based lab, told Bloomberg that Helsing’s Altra software package, while it has problems that the company is trying to solve, is currently working really well and can hit targets at distances of up to 75 km. The software is updated on a weekly basis, taking into account the errors that have been identified during operation.

Helsing commented on the software issue and noted that such information would help them better understand how to improve it. At the same time, the company stated that they are aware of cases where equipment was destroyed even after the loss of video communication with the drone: thanks to the software, the drone itself captured and hit the target.

In addition, Bloomberg raised the issue of the transfer of the announced 6,000 HX-2 drones to Ukraine and received a response that these drones are currently being tested in various European countries.

At the same time, the German Ministry of Defense has not yet committed to financing this purchase for Ukraine. This will be done once Helsing fulfills all the basic conditions.

Militarnyi previously reported that the Ukrainian Defense Forces demonstrated the use of new German artificial intelligence attack drones – HF-1 for the first time.

In general, the military positively evaluates the drone and states the need for a much larger number of both drones and trained crews. It will be then possible to effectively cut off enemy logistics and “solve the air defense problem.”