Arquus – John Cockerill Techno Day
As every odd-numbered year, Arquus organizes its Techno Days.
This year’s edition showcases the balanced combination of mobility and armament with John Cockerill. On July 2nd 2024, John Cockerill announced the conclusion of the acquisition process of Arquus, and in the coming exhibitions it is quite probable that the two companies will showcase their products in a single stand.
While recent editions were held at Satory plateau and where mostly static, this year Arquus – John Cockerill went back to the past, presenting their products in off-road dynamic demonstrations that took place at the French Gendarmerie Training Centre, on the Beynes military camp, some 25 km west of Paris.
The major innovation of this meeting between the two manufacturers and military institutions, as well as numerous delegations and subcontractors, was demonstrated by a lineup of static vehicles, the vast majority of which were equipped with the John Cockerill range of turrets. A Cockerill i-X 4×4 light vehicle, unveiled at the World Defense Show 2022 in Riyadh and showcased at Eurosatory 2024, was on display with the purposely developed unmanned turret armed with a 25 mm cannon. The traditional Arquus booths, as in previous editions, featured augmented vehicles, anti-drone warfare, survivability, energy, digitalization, and open innovation solutions.
The latter was dedicated to the Innovation Challenge for young engineering students, which attracted more than 370 participants. The themes suggested by Arquus mentors focused on ergonomics, embedded systems, predictive maintenance, and advanced connectivity. The winners of the previous Bird project edition were present on site, their solution being integrated into an Arquus vehicle. The Bird winning project is a drone docking station that allows for the secure download of collected information, as well as automated remote independent charging of the airframe batteries. Currently on work-study programmes within the Arquus group, the two young engineers are continuing their innovation, supervised by company mentors. At the same time, a booth specifically dedicated to remotely operated autonomous robotics featured dynamic demonstrations of the Drailer unmanned ground vehicle crossing capabilities, manoeuvrability, and speed.
Arquus’ Hornet subsidiary, a specialist in the remotely operated turret field, showcased its Air Guard System, an integrated anti-drone system, armed with a dual 7.62 mm machine gun stack. Arquus offered no new features in terms of mobility: VAB Mk III, Sherpa Light, and Scarabée, as well as the remotely operated Drailer robot, filled the noticeable absence of the new MAV’Rx 4×4 armoured vehicle; this is currently undergoing hot climate and desert terrain testing in south Namibia; or is it also an opportunity also to approach a potential customer? Time will say.
Arquus provided “armoured” shuttles to allow hosts to reach the dynamic demonstrations area. Guests could board Sherpa Light, Higuard, or Fortress to get to the place where Griffon, Sherpa, Sabre, Bastion, and Fortress, performed their cross-country demonstrations. Many of them were camouflaged in different colour liveries, that could attract particular interest from certain delegations. For their first joint presentation, John Cockerill and Arquus seem to have found the perfect combination of technologies and innovations to blend the two in a most harmonious way. Looking now for orders, primarily focusing on exports.
Photos by Jérôme Hadacek