A partner speaks out

Dominique Vernay, groupe Thales

Dominique Vernay, Technical Director of the Thales group is also a member of Onera's Board of Directors and President of the System@tic competitive cluster. Here he talks about the benefits a partnership with Onera brings to an industrial company.

Signature of the Onera - Thales Air Systems agreement (June 2006). Seated, Denis Maugars, President of Onera, and Thierry Beauvais, Research & Technology Vice-President of Thales Air Systems. Standing, on the right, Dominique Vernay.

The interview

What is Onera's position generally speaking in its partnerships with Thales?

Dominique Vernay: Our group bases its technological excellence on a long tradition of partnerships which leads us to adopt an open model of innovation. We have found that success is founded on the variety of technologies implemented. This implies a multitude of partners. For the basic technologies, like electronics, there are numerous and varied partners. Conversely, for the application aspects, our collaborations are more restricted and we always employ a small number of players. Onera is one of them, an indispensable one with which we try out a good number of our final systems in the fields of radar detection and optronics and which lead directly to some of our products. That's as good as saying that Onera occupies a strategic position in the value added chain in terms of positioning and knowledge

Have you got some examples of applications in mind?

DV: The very fine grain knowledge of wave propagation phenomena is a cornerstone of the systems that we make in the fields of radar and optronics. It conditions their performance and quality, the source of their competitiveness. Onera's knowledge of radar is unique in France and rare in Europe. It increases our systems' detection capabilities and resistance to jamming and makes Onera the preferred partner of Thales for both ground radars and airborne systems. The other field of excellence that we have in common is optronics. Onera has facilities for testing and characterizing targets that are unique in their quality, which is essential for optimizing systems. This means that the Thales and Onera teams often work together to meet the requirements set by the French Armaments Procurement Agency.

Don't these activities generate any competition?
DV: Yes, there is competitiveness between our teams and those of Onera, but at a low level. It encourages our respective creativity in a confrontation of ideas and points of view. This "competitive collaboration" has been the basis for the success of our partnership, like, for example in the field of  passive radars. That said, there are also fields in which Onera has knowledge that Thales lacks, in particular that of low frequency radars.

Are these successes leading to any other collaborations?

DV: Yes, firstly, they are encouraging us to continue with the work, for example, on passive radars which have not yet yielded their full potential for innovation. Onera’s expertise remains essential for our development, just as it was for low frequency radars. It enables us to plan new directions for work, particularly in airborne turbulence detection systems, a crucial problem for air transport because it conditions the minimum distance between two aircraft. We now know how to detect these phenomena using radars or lidars and we know about the problems of airborne avionics. Onera provides us with its wide knowledge of atmospheric phenomena. The collaboration has started and its quality gives cause for hope of some innovations in the coming years.

How do you see this collaboration developing?

DV: In the case of drones, one of the major problems is their insertion into air traffic. One condition of their success is that they must not create an additional risk, in either the military or civil field. Two divisions of Thales are working on it jointly, the Aeronautics division (airborne systems) and the Aerial Systems division (air traffic management), in collaboration with the Onera teams. Elsewhere, environmental concerns, which are becoming increasingly pressing, are leading us to re-examine some fundamental aspects of systems. In both cases, we are counting on Onera's skills.

To summarize, what do you gain from the partnership with Onera?

DV: Aeronautics and the management of air space are fields in which many players are involved and for which we are developing sub-assemblies of complex systems. Therefore, it is not surprising if the leading position occupied by Thales is the result of a strategy of judiciously chosen partnerships. The success of these activities is first of all the result of our ability to access the "right" knowledge. On this point, our partnership with Onera has proved its worth. We also have to be able to optimize our systems, and here, once again, Onera provides us with its skills, equipment and knowledge. This is why the collaboration between Thales and Onera is strong throughout the life of our projects, typically in the region of ten years, both in the phases of research and development.

Last Update: 8 January, 2008 - © ONERA 2009 - Terms of use