The questions buyers ask, answered plainly.

In the United Kingdom. Research, development and manufacturing are all UK based, and 85% of the aircraft is made in house rather than assembled from bought-in modules.

The remaining 15% comes through partners, and we hold partners to the same standard we hold ourselves. We also work with partners in the USA and Australia, which is how the platform is supported outside the UK without moving the build.

For the 85% we build ourselves, yes, because we own the process. For the balance, every partner is required to document three things: where their technology is sourced, where it is manufactured, and how it is manufactured.

That requirement exists because provenance questions are usually answered one tier deep and stop there. Vertical integration is the reason we can answer them at all. The less of the aircraft that comes from somebody else, the shorter the chain a buyer has to audit.

Yes, and we will not claim otherwise. There is a defined pathway to remove China from the supply chain, and that pathway is not complete.

We publish this plainly because the alternative is worse. A supplier who claims a clean supply chain and cannot evidence it costs a buyer far more than one who states the current position and the route out of it. If your requirement has a hard exclusion, tell us at the enquiry stage and we will tell you exactly where the programme stands against it.

ShadowVu UK is not ITAR restricted. We are required to follow United Kingdom export guidelines, and every order is assessed against them for the specific configuration, destination and end use.

Two conditions apply to every sale. We ship aircraft only for surveillance or life-saving purposes, and an End User Certificate is required on purchase. Thermal cameras with a two-axis gimbal are supplied as non-ITAR items.

That is our position, not a blanket clearance. Your own obligations in your territory remain yours, and we will tell you plainly if a configuration or destination is one we will not supply.

That assessment is part of the enquiry, not an afterthought. Bring us the destination, the end user and the intended use and we will work through the position with you rather than quote you a status that would not survive scrutiny.

It means owning and controlling the means of production. The design authority sits with us, the design rights are held with the final design for manufacture, the aircraft is manufactured in the UK, and 85% of it is built in house.

It does not mean a supply chain with zero Chinese content, because that work is in progress. Sovereign is used on this site to describe control of design and manufacture, not as a synonym for a finished exclusion.

It is real and it is specific. The airframe is repairable in the field after a thirty foot drop, using ordinary tools, by someone working remotely rather than a trained depot technician.

It works because of what the aircraft is not. There are no exotic materials and no complex assembly, so a damaged aircraft resolves to a small number of replaceable components and a parts bin rather than a return shipment. The practical consequence is fleet availability: a damaged airframe can be back in the air the same day.

What the claim does not say is that any impact from any height leaves the aircraft undamaged, or that payloads and sensors carry the same tolerance. It says the airframe architecture is designed to be rebuilt rather than written off.

No. There are none to claim, and we would rather say that than list something you would find is not there.

That includes CAGE and DUNS codes, airworthiness and insurance approvals, and any quality or defence accreditation. Where a tender requires one, tell us which, and we will give you a straight answer on what is in place, what is in progress and what is not started.

It is a TAKT time: three minutes to produce one complete unit on the production line. It is a manufacturing figure first, not a marketing one.

It is achievable because of Click-Fit™, the airframe architecture the whole platform is built on. Components locate and lock without specialist assembly or specialist labour, which is what allows a line of 15 operators to hold that rate.

The same architecture is why a field rebuild uses the same steps and the same ordinary tools as the line. The build was designed for volume before it was designed for anything else, and field maintainability came out of that decision rather than being added to it.

QC0 Scout carries a fixed camera only, no external payload, on a 6 inch frame. QC1 Ranger carries 1.8 kg external on a 7 inch frame. QC2 Huey carries 2 to 9.5 kg (± 0.5 kg) external across five prop sizes from 8 to 18 inches. FW1 Hawk, the fixed-wing airframe, carries 1.8 kg (± 0.2 kg) internal.

QC3 Interceptor is in development and is not available to order. Its published figures, including a 4 kg maximum gross weight, are estimates rather than measured performance.

Payload bays are flexible. Fixed or gimballed cameras are standard options, and mission-specific payloads are developed in house through ShadowVu® Labs or jointly with partners.

Almost everything except the frame. RTK native navigation, manual and autonomous control, the same ground control stack, the same fixed or gimballed camera options, flexible payload mounting and the same Click-Fit™ construction run across the family.

That is a procurement point as much as an engineering one. One common platform means one parts inventory across a mixed fleet, one set of field maintenance procedures, and a crew trained on one airframe that is most of the way to being trained on the rest. It also means no duplicate machinery on the production line.

RTK is built into the navigation of every airframe rather than offered as an add-on kit on selected models. Precise positioning is a property of the platform, not a variant of it.

For an operator that shows up as repeatable flight lines. A scheduled autonomous sortie flies the same track today as it flew last week, which is what makes survey comparison, change detection and unattended patrol worth running on a cycle. RTK correction can be carried on a mobile or satellite subscription alongside airtime and data.

TAK and ATAK, and QGroundControl. Both are established, widely used and already familiar to most defence, public safety and survey crews.

We chose existing stacks rather than writing a proprietary one so that a fleet integrates with the tools an organisation already runs, and so that operator training transfers in both directions. Fleet-level management, live viewing and data sharing sit above this in ShadowVu® Everest.

The aircraft are BVLOS capable, and with Quad-Dock™ they fly autonomous beyond visual line of sight missions with no person on site. That is the engineering position.

The regulatory position is separate and we do not hold BVLOS approval in any specific territory. Approval is granted per territory, per operator and usually per operation, and it is normally held by the operator rather than the manufacturer.

We can support an application with the technical detail an aviation authority asks for. We cannot transfer an approval to you, and any supplier who implies otherwise is worth a second look.

Swarm capability is packaged for mobility: an AI swarm deployment fits in a vehicle box or a shipping container, so the capability travels to the operation rather than the operation coming to a fixed site.

The 495 figure is a stated packing configuration, not a flight claim. One 20 ft container holds 11 trays of QC2 Huey at the 8 inch frame size, which totals 495 units in a single container. Different airframes and frame sizes give different totals.

On sticker price, an imported consumer-derived platform will usually be cheaper. We will say that rather than pretend otherwise. The comparison changes when you model attrition and repair across a year of operations instead of a single purchase.

Two variables do most of the work. First, what a damaged aircraft costs: with a modular, field-repairable airframe the answer is a component and an hour, not a capital asset and a return shipment. Second, what the fleet costs to keep flying: one common platform means one parts inventory, one maintenance procedure and one training pathway across a mixed fleet.

So the honest test is your operating profile. If you fly a small number of aircraft in benign conditions and rarely lose one, purchase price dominates and the arithmetic may not favour us. If aircraft get damaged, lost or flown hard, the arithmetic inverts. And if provenance is a procurement condition, the imported platform may not be eligible at any price.

No. Pricing is specified per fleet, against a configuration rather than a catalogue line.

That is not evasion, it is that the variables are real: airframe mix, frame sizes, payloads, Everest seats, Quad-Dock™ units, mobile and satellite subscriptions for airtime, data and RTK, spares holding, training and support. Two fleets of the same aircraft count can be very different propositions. Send us the requirement and you will get a specified price against it.

First shipment is six to eight weeks from order. Production capacity runs up to 10,000 to 100,000 units per month depending on the model, so quantity is rarely the constraint on that first date.

Confirm it at enquiry rather than relying on this page. The first plant is targeted to be operational at the end of Q2 2026, and a date quoted against a specific configuration and quantity will always be firmer than a published range.

Five routes, and most organisations use more than one. Direct purchase for enterprise, government and defence buyers. Distributor and reseller purchase in the UK, USA, EU and Australia. Managed service contracts where you want the capability rather than the asset. Everest seats and mobile or satellite subscriptions, which are recurring rather than capital. And an online portal for kits, parts and accessories once a fleet is running.

For organisations that want to build rather than buy, airframe manufacturing as a sub-contractor and manufacture under licence are both available routes. Terms are set per agreement, since design rights are held with the final design for manufacture.

You buy parts, not airframes. Spares are available directly and through the online sales portal for kits, parts and accessories, and the components that fail or get damaged most often are deliberately inexpensive.

Because every airframe shares one platform, a single spares holding covers a mixed fleet. That is the difference between stocking parts for five aircraft types and stocking parts for one, and it is usually a bigger line in a five year model than the aircraft themselves.

Yes, through ShadowVu® Labs. Flexible tooling adapts to a new variant in about two weeks, because the tooling was designed to be reconfigured rather than replaced.

Be clear about what that two weeks covers: it is the tooling adaptation to get a new variant into production. Requirement definition, payload engineering, integration and testing sit around it and are scoped per project. The point of the figure is that a mission-specific variant is a production decision here rather than a product cycle.

Both are offered. Manufacture under licence suits organisations with a sovereign manufacturing requirement of their own, and airframe manufacturing as a sub-contractor suits programmes that need a volume airframe under someone else’s system.

Commercial terms are set per agreement. ShadowVu holds a filed and pending patent, a UK registered trademark and further trademark rights, and design rights with the final design for manufacture, so any licence is negotiated against that position rather than granted from a template.

Hands-on flight training from first solo through to advanced mission planning, plus custom courses built around a specific industry application rather than around an airframe.

Courses also cover compliance and safety certification guidance for the territory you operate in, and support continues as crews and fleets grow. Because the platform is common across airframes, a crew trained on one aircraft is most of the way to being trained on the rest.

ShadowVu has a Memorandum of Understanding with the Regional Training Center in Fountain Valley, California, signed in October 2025, covering global drone training and public safety.

Standard and extended warranty options are available, covering manufacturing defects and key components, with repair or replacement handled quickly enough to keep the fleet flying.

Modularity changes the shape of a claim. Because the airframe is built from replaceable components, a fault usually resolves to a part rather than an aircraft, which keeps the cost and the disruption of a defect proportionate to the defect. Specific terms and durations are set out in the contract rather than published here.

Ordinary hand tools, no specialist jig and no factory-trained technician. The aircraft is designed so that someone working remotely can diagnose the damage, replace the affected components and put the airframe back in the air.

That is a design property, not a service promise. There are no exotic materials and no complex assembly to unpick, so the repair is a swap rather than a rebuild. Where something genuinely cannot be fixed in the field, expert diagnostics, in-house repair and a simplified returns process are there as the fallback rather than the default.

Everest is the enterprise fleet management and data platform: deployment, management and control of aircraft at scale, with live viewing, telemetry, data sharing and collaborative use in one place.

It is licensed as seats, so the cost scales with the number of people who need access rather than with the number of aircraft. That matters for organisations where a small fleet is watched by a large team, and for shared operations where more than one organisation needs the same picture.

Quad-Dock™ charges the aircraft and launches it again without a person present. It turns a piloted asset into persistent, scheduled coverage of a fixed site.

For a perimeter, a compound or a linear asset, that is the difference between a flight when a pilot is available and a flight on a schedule. Quad-Dock is a trademark of ShadowVu Ltd. As with any beyond visual line of sight operation, the regulatory approval to fly it unattended is held by the operator and granted per territory.

A global support and post sales team stays with the fleet: training, warranty, repairs and returns, spares supply and consultancy.

Consultancy is the part buyers tend to under-use. Fleet optimisation, compliance and risk assessment, payload customisation and total cost of ownership modelling are all more useful in year two than in the week before purchase, when the operating data is real rather than estimated.

ShadowVu. Training, warranty, repairs and consultancy are handled by the manufacturer rather than passed down to a reseller, because the people who designed the airframe are the people who know how to keep it flying.

Distributors and resellers represent the platform commercially in the UK, USA, EU and Australia, and they are supported to stand behind it. The engineering answer still comes from the people who drew the aircraft.

Jim Thomson is the founder, and holds both the Chief Executive Officer and Chief Technology Officer roles. Dean Higgins is Chief Operating Officer.

The company is small and technically led by design at this stage, which is why enquiries reach the people who drew the aircraft rather than a sales layer in front of them.

ShadowVu Ltd is a UK private limited company based in Oxford, United Kingdom. Research and development labs and manufacturing are in the UK.

Partners in the USA and Australia extend support and distribution into those markets. The build stays in the UK.

Four are in production: QC0 Scout, QC1 Ranger, QC2 Huey and FW1 Hawk.

QC3 Interceptor is in development and is not available to order. Its stated figures, including 600 to 700 km/h and a 4 kg maximum gross weight, are estimates for a design in development, not measured performance of a delivered aircraft. We list it because buyers plan two years out, not because it can be bought.

The operating plan is a line model. One line of 15 operators on a single shift produces 105,000 or more units per year. Three lines produce 315,000 or more. Five lines produce 500,000 or more. Five lines running three shifts reach 1,500,000 units per year.

A facility of 40,000 to 60,000 sq ft supports the first three to five lines. Several territories are under evaluation and the final location of the first plant is not yet determined. The plant is targeted to be operational at the end of Q2 2026.

Capacity scales by adding identical lines rather than by redesigning the process, which is the point of a single common platform with no duplicate machinery. Current production volumes are not published.

Plan against 1,500,000. That is the line model at five lines running three shifts, and the line model is the operating plan.

The other set of numbers, 20 airframes per minute, 10,000 per day and 10 million per year, are the platform’s designed capacity at full build-out. They describe what the platform architecture and the three minute TAKT time would permit at unlimited lines, sites and shifts. They are not a schedule, and they do not reconcile with the line model.

We publish both with that distinction attached because the alternative is a reader finding the gap unexplained and discounting everything else on the site. The design targets tell you the architecture has headroom. The line model tells you what we are building towards, and it is the one to put in a plan.

A patent is filed and pending. ShadowVu is a UK registered trademark. Quad-Dock and Click-Fit are trademarks used by the company and are not registered trademarks. Design rights are held with the final design for manufacture.

Domains held include shadowvu.com, shadowvu.co.uk, shadowvu.co, quad-dock.com and quaddock.co. We are specific about which marks are registered and which are not, because the distinction matters to anyone doing diligence on the position.

One. In October 2025 ShadowVu and the Regional Training Center of Fountain Valley, California signed a Memorandum of Understanding on global drone training and public safety.

Beyond that, the partner programme runs in three tiers: partners developing payloads and mission systems on the platform, suppliers feeding the manufacturing programme, and distributors representing the platform in the UK, USA, EU and Australia. Every partner is required to document where their technology is sourced, where it is manufactured and how it is manufactured, which is the condition of entry rather than a later audit.