Kova Labs builds cost‑effective autonomous aerial platforms that operate fully independently from launch to mission completion in GPS‑denied, line‑of‑sight‑restricted environments such as dense forests, urban canyons, and electromagnetic‑contested zones.
Funding
Funding not disclosed
Founders
Product
Problem
Conventional unmanned aerial systems rely on GPS, line‑of‑sight control, or continuous human piloting, which become ineffective in dense forests, urban canyons, and environments where electromagnetic signals are jammed or denied. This limits the ability of military forces to conduct persistent surveillance, reconnaissance, or strike missions in such contested terrain.
Solution
Kova Labs delivers cost‑effective autonomous aerial platforms that operate fully independently from launch to mission completion using onboard, vision‑based perception, navigation, and decision‑making. By fusing visual odometry, simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), and AI‑driven obstacle avoidance, the drones maintain situational awareness without GPS or external communications. A single operator can supervise an entire fleet through a command interface that provides high‑level status and mission updates, enabling scalable deployment of unmanned capabilities in denied or degraded environments.
Target Audience
Primary customers are defense organizations and armed forces that require autonomous aerial capabilities for operations in forested, urban, or electronically contested environments.
Features
- Integrated vision‑based SLAM engine that generates real‑time 3‑D maps for navigation under canopy and in urban canyons
- Onboard AI perception stack for obstacle detection, terrain classification, and autonomous decision making
- Satellite‑independent spatial navigation module that sustains global positioning in electromagnetic‑contested zones
- Fleet‑level command console allowing one operator to monitor, task, and retrieve data from multiple drones simultaneously
- Modular airframe design optimized for low cost and rapid production to support large‑scale deployments