Thales has used Eurosatory 2026 to push Schiebel’s S-301 into the Apache wingman contest, casting the armed VTOL drone as a sovereign loyal-wingman platform for ISR, precision strike and counter-drone work. The company says the larger airframe can carry heavier payloads than the S-101, including Toutatis loitering munitions, LMM/Martlet missiles and 70 mm laser-guided rockets, with capacity for up to ten Martlets in one configuration.
That pitch sits inside Project NYX, where Thales and Schiebel are among the four teams selected to develop uncrewed companions for the UK Army’s AH-64E fleet. The industrial logic is clear: persistent sensing, autonomous routing and weapons effects from a rotary-wing system built for contested airspace.
The next test is integration, not concept.