Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE) was established on 5th January 1959, with the mandate to support the acquisition of equipment by the Air Force and type approval of aeronautical stores supplied by the industry.... ADE was located on a 9 acre plot in temporary hutments in 'B' & 'C' camps at High Grounds, Bengaluru, which now houses the Jawaharlal Nehru Planetarium and Legislature's Home. ADE has grown from 9 acres to 4,387 acres, which includes ATR at Chitradurga.
During sixties, in addition to the mandated tasks such as Evaluation trials of specialized equipment imported by IAF and Evaluation of Aircraft for type certification, ADE saw the development of Hovercraft. ADE made valuable strides in the areas of Ground Transmitter - Receiver, Regulated Power Supply Unit, IFF equipment, etc. during the period.
Rapid expansion of R&D activities took place during the seventies and eighties. During this period, ADE was assigned the task of Design and Development of air-launched expendable target aircraft systems, Pilot training simulators, Re-usable rocket pods, Head-up displays, Electro-optic sensors, Flight Control System evaluation, Glass Fibre Reinforced Plastic radome, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) of two classes - the high speed UAV for realistic simulation of enemy aircraft and low speed UAVs for Reconnaissance and Surveillance purposes and Digital fly-by-wire FCS for Light Combat Aircraft.
The Nineties saw the emergence of ADE as a major Aeronautical Systems Research Laboratory of the Defense R&D Organization and practically involved in all major aspects of aeronautical research, design & development, pertaining to military aviation.
The period since 2000 has become a very productive one for ADE in the areas of Delivery of Nishant to Army under LSP; Delivery of PTA Lakshya to all three services through LSP; Development of Rustom 1 MALE UAV; Development & Production of AGCS; Development of Rustom 2 (TAPAS) MALE UAV; Development of DFCC for UAVs & Tejas; Delivery of CPSS to Airforce; Delivery of APTT, Development and realization of FLYDAQ - a Field deployed telemetry station for UAV development flights; Development of Mini & Micro UAVs, etc.
Recently, sixth launch of Subsonic Cruise Missile - Nirbhay was conducted from Integrated Test Range, Balasore. Aeronautical Test Range (ATR) at Chitradurga was inaugurated by the then Defence Minister, Sh. Arun Jaitley on 28th May 2017. Design Validation Flights of Rustom II are under progress ATR. Around hundred flights of Rustom II have been carried out to validate the aerodynamic and operational capabilities of the aircraft.
Vision
To be a centre of excellence for development of state-of-the-art Unmanned Aircraft Systems,... Cruise Weapon Systems, Flight Control Systems, Flight Simulators and Associated Ground Operational Systems.
Mission
To Design, Develop and Lead to production of Unmanned Aircraft Systems, Cruise Weapon Systems,... Flight Control Systems, Flight Simulators and Associated Ground Operational Systems.
