In the landscape of modern electronic warfare, losing GPS isn’t just an inconvenience—it is a critical vulnerability that can ground unmanned fleets and blind reconnaissance missions. Addressing this urgent defense challenge, Hyderabad-based deep-tech startup PhoQtek Labs has successfully demonstrated a GPS-denied autonomous drone during the Indian Air Force’s (IAF) Dronathon 2026 at the Pokhran Field Firing Range.
Held from September 14 to 16, 2026, and inaugurated by Vice Chief of the Air Staff Air Marshal Ashutosh Dixit, Dronathon 2026 was designed to push drone technology, autonomous systems, and counter-drone capabilities out of the laboratory and into realistic, contested field environments.
The Challenge: Surviving in a Contested Electromagnetic Spectrum
Conventional military and commercial drones rely heavily on GPS/GNSS signals for positioning, navigation, and critical functions like “return-to-home.” However, in a contested battlefield, adversaries routinely deploy electronic warfare (EW) tactics to jam or spoof these satellite signals.
When satellite navigation is disrupted, an aircraft can lose its bearings, drift off course, or crash. PhoQtek Labs’ demonstration at Pokhran specifically tackled this scenario, successfully flying an autonomous drone in conditions where satellite signals were denied and electronic jamming was actively present.
The Technology Stack: How PhoQtek Navigates Without Satellites
Incorporated in January 2025, PhoQtek Labs has rapidly developed a sophisticated suite of technologies to enable unmanned systems to “see” and “feel” their way through GPS-denied environments. Their approach relies on sensor fusion and edge computing rather than satellite positioning:
- GarudaNAV: A visual-navigation module designed specifically for GPS-denied and degraded environments. It combines visual sensing with inertial data to support precise localization.
- FOG IMU (Fibre-Optic Gyroscope Inertial Measurement Unit): Unlike standard MEMS sensors, FOG IMUs utilize the Sagnac effect to measure rotation with extreme stability. This provides highly accurate inertial data for aerospace and defense applications, minimizing navigation drift over time.
- Visual-Inertial Odometry & Terrain Matching: By utilizing onboard cameras, the drone maps its surroundings and matches terrain or landmarks against its internal database to calculate its exact position.
- KARN AI: An edge-based autonomous intelligence platform that processes all this sensor data onboard the aircraft. This allows the drone to make real-time navigational decisions without relying on cloud connectivity, high-bandwidth datalinks, or external infrastructure.
The company is also actively developing next-generation photonic integrated circuit-based inertial cores, aiming to further miniaturize and enhance these capabilities for future UAVs and UGVs.
Strategic Impact for the Indian Armed Forces
The ability to operate autonomously in a GPS-denied environment is rapidly becoming a baseline requirement for next-generation military drones. PhoQtek’s technology has several high-value strategic applications:
- Uninterrupted ISR: Surveillance and reconnaissance platforms can continue their missions deep inside contested airspace without fear of EW disruption.
- Retrofitting Legacy Fleets: PhoQtek has outlined plans to develop retrofit navigation kits. This would allow the military to upgrade existing, legacy multi-rotor and fixed-wing UAVs with GPS-denied capabilities, saving billions in replacement costs.
- Swarm Resilience: Autonomous drone swarms rely on precise relative positioning. GPS-denied navigation ensures swarms can maintain formation and coordinate strikes even when satellite links are severed.
The Bigger Picture: IAF Dronathon 2026
PhoQtek’s demonstration was part of a broader push by the Indian Air Force to indigenize and modernize its unmanned fleet. Alongside the field trials, the IAF used Dronathon 2026 to unveil Vayu UTtaM, an indigenous multi-mode Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) system designed to track military and civil drones in real-time. The IAF also released a comprehensive roadmap for the future of unmanned and autonomous systems in the Indian military.
A Note on Verification and Next Steps
While the successful flight at Pokhran is a massive validation milestone for PhoQtek Labs, the defense-tech community awaits further technical telemetry. Publicly available data has not yet confirmed exact flight durations, precise navigation drift rates, payload capacities, or the specific spectrum of the RF jamming used during the trial. Furthermore, while industry reports highlight PhoQtek’s success, official claims of being the only company to successfully navigate the jamming environment have not been formally verified by the Ministry of Defence or the IAF.
Looking Ahead
For a startup incorporated just over a year ago, demonstrating edge-AI-driven, GPS-denied navigation at a premier IAF field exercise is a monumental achievement. The next phase for PhoQtek Labs will be translating this field-validation into repeatable, scalable, and measurable production systems. If successful, their technology stack could play a pivotal role in bulletproofing India’s autonomous defense fleet against the electronic warfare threats of tomorrow.
