Unveiling HENSOLDT’s Cutting-Edge TwInvis Passive Radar Technology

HENSOLDT, the innovator of the cutting-edge Air Defense and Weapon Locating Radar COBRA, now unveils its advanced passive radar system TwInvis.

With the TwInvis passive radar, HENSOLDT has transformed traditional radar technology. This system operates without emitting signals, ensuring it remains nearly undetectable. Nonetheless, it is capable of spotting aircraft equipped with stealth mechanisms.

For the first time, TwInvis facilitates monitoring of airspace across a distance of up to 250 kilometers, without transmitting radar signals. Mobile and seamlessly integrated into a compact van or all-terrain vehicle, this radar’s applications are nearly limitless, ranging from air surveillance during crucial events to civil aviation oversight and military uses.

Standard radar systems rely on a common principle: they emit signals that bounce off an object. The radar then visualizes that object based on the echo received. TwInvis adopts a fundamentally different method: the system utilizes the myriad radio signals that are already present in the air from broadcast and television transmitters, analyzing their echoes when reflected by an object.

Enhanced Security

For political and corporate gatherings, safety is paramount. In this scenario, a mobile TwInvis could accurately monitor small aircraft without broadcasting any signals of its own. Thanks to its groundbreaking technology, it can be installed directly in valleys and supervise airspace, which previously required significant effort, if feasible at all, with conventional radar systems.

Furthermore, TwInvis could, for instance, detect smugglers’ aircraft in a designated area, enhance security in metropolitan regions, or serve as a cost-effective addition to standard radar in aviation management. Since it doesn’t emit any signals, it can even operate without additional official permissions.

This ‘super radar’ is made possible by enhanced computing capabilities and a unique offering from HENSOLDT: a highly sensitive, multi-channel digital receiver technology that can detect radar echoes that are up to ten billion times weaker than the emitted signal, accommodating up to 25 transmitters simultaneously.

Invisible Operations

In the military domain, TwInvis combines numerous advantages. Beyond its exceptional mobility, the system itself remains ‘invisible,’ meaning that it cannot be jammed or eliminated through targeted actions. At the same time, it can also identify previously undetectable stealth aircraft that traditional radar systems fail to capture due to their low observable technology.

Stealth technology ensures that an aircraft employing it does not emit any radar signals. Instead, these signals are absorbed by the aircraft’s surface, rendering them undetectable.

TwInvis exposes this technology’s vulnerability by reliably identifying the echoes within the frequency band of broadcast and television signals. Stealth aircraft thus become detectable.

Upcoming Market Launch

A single TwInvis can surveil airspace over a span of 250 kilometers. Up to 200 aircraft can be observed simultaneously in 3D (both range and altitude). Moreover, multiple TwInvis units can be interconnected into a networked system to oversee even larger regions, coastlines, or borders.

TwInvis has already showcased its capabilities in a series of impressive demonstrations to military clients, air traffic control authorities, and other interested stakeholders.