The manufacturer on Friday said it plans to conduct the first flight of its uncrewed collaborative combat aircraft (UCCA) system’which combines Kratos” experimental XQ-58A Valkyrie and its own mission software’alongside a Eurofighter Typhoon this year. It aims to deliver the UCCA system to the German Air Force by 2029.

Like the collaborative combat aircraft (CCA) platforms being pursued by different branches of the U.S. military, Airbus” UCCA is designed to handle missions that place human pilots in risky situations. The uncrewed aircraft will be commanded by crewed fighters like the Typhoon, which was jointly developed by Airbus, Leonardo, and BAE Systems to serve as part of Europe’s Future Combat Air System (FCAS).

Marco Gumbrecht, a retired German Air Force lieutenant colonel and Eurofighter pilot who now heads Airbus” key account Germany, said the manufacturer is ?confident” it can deliver the capability ?at a very affordable price.”

“We are offering the German customer exactly what Germany and Europe urgently need in the current geopolitical situation: a proven flying uncrewed combat aircraft with a sovereign European mission system that does not have to be developed from scratch in a time-consuming and costly manner,” Gumbrecht said in a statement.

Airbus said it is equipping its Multiplatform Autonomous Reconfigurable and Secure (MARS) system on two Valkyries, the first it received under a partnership with U.S. manufacturer Kratos agreed to in July.

MARS is designed to support FCAS’the European equivalent of the U.S. military’s Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) program’and deliver full collaborative combat capability by 2040.