Hanwha Aerospace successfully demonstrated an integrated manned-unmanned combat system during Demo Day at the BSDA 2026 international defense expo in Romania. The company, the only South Korean exhibitor at the event, staged the exercise at an outdoor tactical training area near Bucharest, linking the wheeled armored vehicle TIGON, Hanwha’s multipurpose unmanned vehicle GRUNT, and Estonia’s Milrem Robotics THeMIS to simulate future battlefield scenarios.
Senior military leaders and defense industry representatives attended the demonstration, including Romanian Chief of Army Staff Maj. Gen. Ciprian Marin, Deputy Chief of Defense Staff for Resources Mircea Gologan, Deputy Chief of Army Staff Daniel Pop, and more than 50 industry delegates. In the opening phase, operators dispatched the GRUNT and THeMIS unmanned ground vehicles into hazardous areas to conduct reconnaissance and surveillance in coordination with drones, while the TIGON armored vehicle handled troop transport and provided fire support. The exercise then progressed to unmanned resupply and casualty evacuation missions, illustrating a practical manned-unmanned teaming concept.
The GRUNT is a next‑generation multipurpose unmanned ground vehicle based on the Arion‑SMET platform. It uses a hybrid drive, offers a maximum payload capacity of 900 kg (about 1,984 lb), and incorporates autonomous follow driving, automatic detection and tracking, and electronic‑warfare countermeasures. On‑site participants expressed strong interest in the vehicle’s capabilities.
In a later integrated demonstration led by the Romanian Army, the GRUNT and THeMIS executed reconnaissance and surveillance tasks, demonstrating their ability to protect troops and support maneuver operations.
The event marked the first time a domestically developed South Korean military UGV demonstrated operational performance in Europe, validating its competitiveness in the European and global UGV markets. By enabling real‑time interlinking between manned and unmanned systems, Hanwha showcased a future ground‑combat concept capable of responding to a range of tactical scenarios and aligned with the next‑generation operational priorities sought by NATO and European customers.
A Romanian commander who observed the demonstration said, "This exercise confirmed how existing weapon systems and UGV forces can be integrated operationally. It was an excellent opportunity to evaluate the strengths of Hanwha’s multipurpose unmanned vehicle."
Park Byung‑ho, head of Hanwha Aerospace’s LS4 business unit, said, "Our domestically developed UGV completed its first performance demonstration in Europe, proving its technological competitiveness and operational scalability in the global market. We validated manned‑unmanned combined‑operations capabilities in a live, tactical environment and presented not only the next‑generation ground‑warfare concepts NATO and our European customers are seeking, but also a development direction for multipurpose unmanned systems that our military is pursuing."
