🛡 Security & DefenceMAINS · GS3.12

DRDO completes trials of ULPGM-V3 missile

An indigenous drone-launched precision guided missile cleared in both air-to-ground and air-to-air modes, now ready for serial production.

What happened

The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) completed the final deliverable configuration development trials of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Launched Precision Guided Missile (ULPGM)-V3.
The trials were carried out in both modes the weapon is designed for — Air-to-Ground and Air-to-Air — at the DRDO test range near Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh.
An integrated Ground Control System (GCS) commanded the weapon system through the trials, demonstrating the full launch-to-engagement loop.
The missile was integrated on the unmanned aerial vehicle by Newspace Research and Technologies, Bengaluru, and flown to engage representative targets.
DRDO declared the system ready for serial mass production, having developed it entirely through the Indian ecosystem with the participation of many MSMEs.
Raksha Mantri Rajnath Singh and DRDO Chairman Dr Samir V. Kamat congratulated the teams associated with the development.

Background & context

A precision guided munition (PGM) is a weapon that homes onto a designated target using a guidance package — typically electro-optical, imaging-infrared or laser seekers feeding a control loop — rather than relying on ballistic accuracy alone. The ULPGM family is India's answer to a specific battlefield need: a small, accurate missile that a drone can carry and fire, so that a remotely operated platform — not a manned aircraft or a soldier in the open — delivers the strike. The "Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Launched" prefix is the defining feature; the launch platform is a UAV, and the missile is sized and weighted to be carried in numbers by such a platform.

The "V3" designation places this within an incremental DRDO development line. Earlier ULPGM efforts focused on the anti-armour role — putting a guided anti-tank weapon under a drone so it could loiter, find a tank or bunker, and strike with precision from stand-off range. The V3 variant widens that envelope: it is built to operate in two distinct modes from the same drone-launched platform, which is what makes the completed trials notable. The development sits squarely inside India's larger push for Aatmanirbharta (self-reliance) in defence, under which the Ministry of Defence has steadily moved categories of equipment onto positive indigenisation lists and routed orders to domestic developers and producers.

The administering chain here is worth fixing in memory. DRDO is the apex defence research agency of India, functioning under the Department of Defence Research and Development (DDR&D) within the Ministry of Defence. DRDO does not itself mass-produce weapons; it develops the system and then transfers the technology to production agencies — here, two Defence Public Sector Undertaking and private partners — while bodies such as Bharat Dynamics manufacture the missiles for induction into the armed forces. The trial-to-production pathway demonstrated by ULPGM-V3 — DRDO develops, designated labs build sub-systems, MSMEs supply components, and named production agencies scale it up — is the template the Ministry now favours for indigenous platforms.

Each of the named DRDO laboratories carries a distinct competence, which is why a single missile draws on several. The lead lab, Research Centre Imarat (RCI), is DRDO's specialist in missile guidance, control, avionics and inertial systems — the "brain" of a guided weapon. The Defence Research and Development Laboratory (DRDL), also in Hyderabad, is DRDO's premier missile-systems laboratory responsible for overall missile design and integration. The Terminal Ballistics Research Laboratory (TBRL), Chandigarh, handles warhead and terminal-effect engineering — how the missile defeats its target on impact. The High Energy Materials Research Laboratory (HEMRL), Pune, develops propellants and explosives — the energetic materials that power and arm the missile. Reading these four together gives a clean picture of how DRDO distributes the sub-systems of one weapon across specialised centres, a frequently testable structure.

It is also useful to place the production partners. Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) is a Defence Public Sector Undertaking headquartered in Hyderabad and India's principal manufacturer of guided missiles, having produced systems across the Akash and anti-tank families for the armed forces. Pairing BDL with Adani Defence Systems & Technologies, a private-sector firm, on the same programme is a deliberate signal that India's defence-industrial base now spans both state-owned and private manufacturers. Newspace Research and Technologies, the Bengaluru integrator, is a private drone-and-autonomy company, underlining that the unmanned launch platform itself comes from the domestic start-up ecosystem rather than an import.

For Prelims

Full form: ULPGM = Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Launched Precision Guided Missile; the variant trialled is V3.
What it is: a drone-launched precision guided missile cleared in two modes — Air-to-Ground (anti-tank role) and Air-to-Air (against drones, helicopters and other airborne targets).
Developer / nodal lab: Research Centre Imarat (RCI), Hyderabad — a DRDO missile-and-avionics laboratory — acting as the lead lab.
Associated DRDO labs: DRDL Hyderabad (Defence Research & Development Laboratory), TBRL Chandigarh (Terminal Ballistics Research Laboratory) and HEMRL Pune (High Energy Materials Research Laboratory).
Production agencies: Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL), Hyderabad — a Defence PSU and India's principal guided-missile manufacturer — and Adani Defence Systems & Technologies Limited, Hyderabad (a private partner).
UAV integrator: Newspace Research and Technologies, Bengaluru, which integrated the weapon onto the drone platform.
Command element: an integrated Ground Control System (GCS) commanded the weapon during trials.
Test site: DRDO test range near Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh.
Indigenous content: developed and produced entirely through the Indian ecosystem with participation of many MSMEs; declared ready for serial mass production.
Parent agency chain: DRDO → Department of Defence Research and Development → Ministry of Defence.

What it is NOT: ULPGM-V3 is not a long-range strategic or ballistic missile, and it is not a stand-alone surface-to-air system — it is a small, drone-carried tactical PGM. It is not the same as DRDO's helicopter-launched HELINA / Dhruvastra anti-tank missile or the Nag/MPATGM ground-launched anti-tank missiles, though all share the anti-armour role; the distinguishing feature of ULPGM is that its launch platform is an unmanned aerial vehicle. It is also not produced by DRDO itself — DRDO develops it, while BDL and Adani Defence are the named production agencies.

For UPSC: ULPGM-V3 = DRDO drone-launched precision guided missile, trialled in two modes (anti-tank air-to-ground + air-to-air), RCI Hyderabad as nodal lab, produced by BDL + Adani Defence, integrated on UAV by Newspace, tested near Kurnool — a fully indigenous system ready for serial production.

Why it matters

The strategic value of a drone-launched PGM lies in unmanned precision strike. A loitering UAV armed with ULPGM-V3 can find, track and destroy a tank, bunker or vehicle from stand-off range without exposing a pilot or a forward observer, and the dual-mode design means the same drone can also be tasked against hostile drones and helicopters — directly addressing the fast-growing threat of small UAVs over the battlefield, a lesson reinforced by recent conflicts where cheap drones have proven outsized in effect. Pairing a precision missile with a UAV thus folds a counter-drone and counter-air capability into what was primarily an anti-armour weapon.

The deeper significance is industrial. By building the missile end-to-end inside the domestic ecosystem — RCI and partner DRDO labs for design and sub-systems, MSMEs for components, and BDL plus a private firm for production — the programme demonstrates a maturing indigenous missile supply chain rather than a single laboratory prototype. Declaring the system "ready for serial mass production" at the end of development trials signals that the design has frozen and the manufacturing partners are positioned to scale, which shortens the path from trial to induction and reduces import dependence in a category where India has historically relied on foreign suppliers. The visible participation of a private defence firm alongside the traditional Defence PSU also illustrates the widening of India's defence-industrial base beyond government-owned manufacturers.

A dual-mode drone-launched missile is also significant for what it consolidates onto one platform. Traditionally, anti-tank guided missiles, counter-drone interceptors and air-to-air weapons sat on separate launchers and platforms. A UAV that can fire a missile usable against both ground armour and airborne targets compresses that tasking — a single loitering drone can switch roles within a mission, which matters in the kind of contested, drone-saturated airspace seen in recent conflicts. For the Indian Army and Air Force, such a capability adds a flexible, attritable precision-strike option that can be fielded forward without risking crewed aircraft, complementing rather than replacing the heavier helicopter- and ground-launched anti-tank systems already in service.

For Mains

Exemplification

ULPGM-V3 is a concrete, current example of indigenisation of niche defence technology — a fully home-built drone-launched precision guided missile cleared for serial production, usable to illustrate the Aatmanirbharta-in-defence drive in any GS-III answer on indigenous technology development.

Substantiation

It supplies hard data points for an answer on India's defence R&D ecosystem — DRDO as developer, RCI Hyderabad as nodal lab with DRDL/TBRL/HEMRL support, BDL and Adani Defence as production agencies, Newspace as UAV integrator, and MSME participation across the supply chain.

Way-forward

The trial-to-production model shown here — DRDO design plus PSU-and-private production plus MSME components — is a usable "way forward" for self-reliant defence manufacturing and the absorption of unmanned and counter-drone technologies into the armed forces.

Deploys into: indigenisation of technology and developing new technology (GS3.12); achievements of Indians in science and technology; and the role of drones and counter-drone systems in internal and external security.

Ministry of Defence · 2026-05-19 · PRID 2263045 · PIB source ↗