LONDON/KYIV — The United Kingdom has become the first international partner whose defence companies will gain access to Ukraine’s Avengers Labs, an artificial intelligence platform that uses real battlefield data to train and test AI models for unmanned systems.
Up to 12 British defence companies will be selected for the programme. They will work inside the secure Avengers Labs environment and will not be allowed to download or directly extract the dataset.
AI Development for Drone Swarms
The first UK-Ukraine competition will focus on AI models for swarms of unmanned systems. The models are intended to help drones work together, detect threats and identify targets, including when communication with human operators is limited or global navigation systems are unavailable.
The UK Ministry of Defence’s Rapid AI Delivery Taskforce (RAID) is leading the selection process. Companies must submit proposals by 11:59 p.m. BST on October 22, 2026, with selected companies expected to be notified by November 6. Phase 1 access is planned for about three months, from late November 2026 to late February 2027. Companies must also complete Ukrainian export-control procedures before receiving access.
More Than 5 Million Battlefield Frames
Avengers Labs is built around an annotated dataset of more than 5 million battlefield frames. Most of the data comes from unmanned systems through Ukraine’s DELTA combat system.
The dataset includes information on tanks, artillery, air defence systems, infantry, Shahed-type UAVs and reconnaissance drones. The data is continuously updated, while information provided through DELTA is anonymised and delayed to reduce risks to military personnel during ongoing operations.
More than 30 Ukrainian defence companies are already using Avengers Labs to train AI models, and three products developed through the platform are already deployed on the battlefield.
Ukraine's Ministry of Defence has reported that AI integration can reduce the time analysts spend searching images and video for enemy targets by up to 90 percent. An AI system trained using Avengers Labs data processes more than 100,000 drone video streams each month and identifies about 70 percent of enemy military targets in real time, according to the Ukrainian ministry.
UK-Ukraine AI Partnership
The cooperation follows an Artificial Intelligence Partnership signed in Kyiv on August 24, 2026, by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham. It forms part of the wider UK-Ukraine 100-Year Partnership.
The agreement covers joint AI model development, secure data channels, computing resources and AI reliability, as well as defence-industry cooperation and academic research into autonomy, AI reliability, cybersecurity and synthetic data.
The programme will combine Ukraine’s combat-derived data and operational experience with expertise from British universities, researchers and technology companies to develop AI capabilities for unmanned systems and other defence applications.
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