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A Ukrainian startup is turning to AI to outsmart the Russian ambush drones blowing up supply trucks

October 14, 2025
A mockup of Blue Eyes’ function shows how Dropla intends for the real-time surveillance product to be used.

Dropla

  • A Ukrainian startup hopes its AI model can help take down Russia’s ambush drones.
  • Russian forces use idle quadcopters as smart IEDs along Ukrainian supply roads.
  • This startup’s software allows Ukrainian quadcopters to quickly detect landmines and drones.

Miles behind the line of contact, Ukraine’s supply runs are getting more dangerous.

Defending troops take weekslong shifts on the “zero line” — a maze of scarred earth, trenches, and bunkers that face Russian drones and assault troops — and rely on provisions delivered by trucks that must navigate landmines and artillery fire.

Such has been the norm in the war for years. But Russia has increasingly deployed a new tactic since this spring: Sneaking explosive-laden quadcopters behind the zero line and lying in wait to ambush those logistics vehicles.

When a convoy approaches, these ambush drones can blindside their targets from as little as 30 feet away. Some of these quadcopters are solar-powered and can lie dormant, or can be unjammable, fiber-optic drones.

It’s turned the forward edge of the battle area into a smart minefield. In that vein, one startup founder thinks his rapid route-clearance solution is precisely what can help.

V’yacheslav Shvaydak, the Ukrainian founder of Denmark-based drone firm Dropla, has been training his company’s artificial intelligence algorithm to detect ambush drones lurking behind Ukrainian lines.

His software, Blue Eyes, is designed to process video feeds from cheap quadcopters as they fly over supply roads in real time.

Shvaydak’s original vision was to have these drones scout the ground just ahead of a convoy, with Blue Eyes analyzing thermal and optical footage to quickly highlight anti-tank and anti-personnel mines shot over the frontline by Russia.

A side-by-side comparison shows two explosive threats highlighted by Blue Eyes in real-time.
A side-by-side comparison shows how Blue Eyes highlights threats to the user.

Dropla

Speed is key, Shvaydak told Business Insider at a small robotics conference in Svendborg, in southern Denmark. The drone must fly simultaneously with the truck on the road because the threat environment can change in minutes.

“If you wait for the drone to fly out and come back to process the data, you can get a delay of something like 30 minutes,” Shvaydak said. “And that’s way too late. Once you leave with the convoy, you can no longer rely on the data.”

Battle-testing AI in Ukraine

Shvaydak said his team includes over two dozen engineers in Ukraine, who have been training their AI model for months to detect more than 170 different types of explosive threats, including landmines, on local battlefield terrain.

After hearing about a rise in ambush drones this summer, they’ve been training the Blue Eyes software to target idling quadcopters, too, Shvaydak said.

Once an enemy landmine or drone is detected, Blue Eyes sends its coordinates to Ukraine’s battle management system, after which commanders can decide what to do. Shvaydak said that commanders can choose to drive around a landmine, but that an ambush drone must typically be destroyed first.

“If we detect 20 drones, it’s potentially 20 saved lives or unmanned equipment,” Shvaydak said.

Federico Borsari, a researcher on drone warfare at the Center for European Policy Analysis think tank, said Ukraine has to work fast to find counters for ambush drones as Russia increasingly leans on the tactic in high-intensity areas such as Pokrovsk, Kupyansk, and Kursk.

Combined with remote mine deployment, ambush drones can “completely disrupt the entire logistical chain” for a frontline area, he told Business Insider.

“Logistical convoys need to basically have constant situational awareness when they move in friendly territory for something like 50 kilometers from the front line because of the threat of ambush drones,” Borsari said.

Ukrainian troops sit in the back of a pickup truck.
Behind the front lines, Ukraine often rotates troops and supplies with civilian trucks and vehicles.

Dmytro Smolienko/Ukrinform/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Traditionally, a large network of radio and optical sensors would be needed to detect idling quadcopters in friendly territory.

But mines and ambush drones are low-cost tools for Russia, so Ukraine needs its own cost-effective way to deal with them, Borsari said.

Battle-testing AI in Ukraine

The most basic version of Blue Eyes includes a 2.1-kg metal box that Shvaydak said hosts the software and connects to Ukrainian command-and-control stations. The program is supposed to work with any quadcopter that has a camera, but the complex can also come with in-built drones and C2 hardware.

Blue Eyes runs on Dropla's C2 hardware.
Dropla provides hardware that it says can integrate with Ukrainian C2 as well.

Dropla

Shvaydak said a drone captures footage of the road, while Blue Eyes receives and rapidly analyzes the video feed, handling up to 130 frames per second.

“We’re hoping to increase the number of frames per second, which will allow the drone to fly at greater speeds,” Shvaydak said. Currently, drones giving data to Blue Eyes have to fly at a speed slower than half that of a typical truck.

Shvaydak declined to disclose details of Blue Eye’s cost, operational limits, and effectiveness, but said that multiple frontline units have been testing it in combat since early summer. Over the next few months, Dropla hopes to scale up its systems deployed near the zero line by fivefold.

Shvaydak holds an anti-tank landmine next to an uncrewed ground vehicle.
Shvaydak poses with a landmine next to an uncrewed ground vehicle, which his startup also makes.

Dropla

He said Ukrainian fighters who have Blue Eyes continually receive updates from Dropla’s AI training data.

“We are constantly, weekly, upgrading new versions of the models,” Shvaydak said.

Many defense contractors, such as Anduril and Saab, have adopted similar products that collate and assess sensors from drones, providing uncrewed systems with a focus on software updates.

A man uses an Anduril VR headset with the Lattice software shown behind him on a screen.
Anduril’s Lattice system is a software that integrates data gathered by all or most of its drone products.

John Keeble/Getty Images

Ukraine has also been gradually integrating AI into its combat operations, such as the DELTA battlespace management system, which organizes data from open-source intelligence, satellite images, drone feeds, and human reports.

Some of Ukraine’s AI development is focused on threat detection for drones. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned in September that the world was entering an AI arms race, with his country now at the forefront.

“It’s only a matter of time, not much, before drones are fighting drones, attacking critical infrastructure and targeting people all by themselves, fully autonomous and no human involved, except the few who control AI systems,” Zelenskyy said.

Route clearance operations are routine in warfare, especially in conflicts like Iraq and Afghanistan, where supply lines were a key target. Small drones enable a wider targeting of supply routes, removing the risk to humans who deploy them.

Borsari said the example of ambush drones shows how quickly and unceasingly today’s militaries must innovate to have a fighting chance.

“There are clear lessons for Western countries as well,” he said. “If you don’t adapt and don’t constantly iterate your technology, you’re going to find a threat way beyond your ability to rapidly create a countermeasure.”

Read the original article on Business Insider

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