Flight software, on a proprietary baseline
The flight-critical control loop runs on Embention's Veronte Autopilot 1x, a certified commercial baseline configured for each vehicle. Apollyon authors the guidance modes, control laws, flight envelope limits, and mission logic that run on top of it, verifying every release on hardware-in-the-loop simulators before flight.
A proprietary flight-control baseline
Operational defence certification in India requires flight-critical software to have a clear origin, an accountable vendor, and a documented qualification history. Open-source autopilots do not meet this standard for military systems.
Apollyon builds on Embention's Veronte Autopilot 1x, a commercial flight controller widely used across uncrewed platforms. The autopilot operates through parameterised configuration rather than source-code modification. We selected a commercial baseline because it provides a proven audit trail, vendor-backed lifecycle support, and strict configuration governance.
Apollyon does not modify the autopilot firmware directly. Instead, our team maintains version-controlled configuration packages containing the control laws, guidance phases, flight envelope limits, control allocation matrices, and failsafe logic. These packages are developed in the vendor's toolchain and loaded onto the controller. The core hardware and baseline firmware remain uniform across our fleet, with one tailored configuration package for each airframe.
Software lifecycle and verification
The toolchain follows four stages around a single configuration package. The exact configuration authored on the bench is what flies in the airframe and what undergoes hardware-in-the-loop simulation, avoiding translation errors between engineering and flight.
| Stage | Tool | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Author | 1x PDI Builder | Control laws, guidance phases, envelope limits, actuation allocation, and safety logic assembled as block programs. |
| Execute | Veronte Autopilot 1x | Flight-critical guidance, navigation and control, state estimation, and actuator commands. |
| Operate | Veronte Ops | Mission planning, live telemetry, commanded actions, flight termination, and system alerts. |
| Verify | HIL Simulator | Production autopilot hardware flown against simulated vehicle dynamics before any field sortie. |
Hardware-in-the-loop before the rail
No configuration package flies until it has been validated on the bench. The Veronte hardware-in-the-loop simulator runs production autopilot hardware against high-fidelity simulated vehicle dynamics in real time. The flight controller under test is the exact unit that flies.
The autopilot receives simulated sensor streams and commands real servo actuators, verifying that control laws, guidance modes, and emergency logic execute exactly as intended in flight.
| Back-end | What it tests |
|---|---|
| X-Plane 11 / 12 | Flight dynamics and control performance for fixed-wing, multirotor and VTOL models. |
| Microsoft Flight Simulator | Extra flight-dynamics coverage and operator training. |
| Simulink | Custom plant models and engineering tests connected directly to the autopilot. |
Engineers inject simulated failures on the test bench—such as surface jamming, sensor dropouts, GPS loss, and electronic interference—against the identical flight software that takes to the air. Sortie telemetry then feeds empirical flight data back into our aerodynamic models to refine subsequent tuning. The sim-to-real flight loop →
Configuration control and certification
Using an established commercial baseline supports both airworthiness certification and technical governance. It provides a formal audit trail for all flight-critical functions.
Every Apollyon configuration package is version-tracked, peer-reviewed, and locked before deployment. The controller enforces release locks and pre-flight checklists, preventing unauthorized field alterations and linking every sortie log back to an approved software build.
The flight-control baseline is supplied with vendor compliance and lifecycle documentation, which Apollyon maintains as part of each platform's formal certification evidence. Airworthiness and qualification claims are made strictly against this certified baseline.
Veronte now, an in-house baseline next
Achieving formal military flight certification for a new autopilot core typically takes years of flight trials and tens of millions of dollars. Embention has invested many years and roughly $40 million into certifying and maturing the Veronte platform. Rather than duplicating that development at the outset—which would add substantial schedule risk to our airframe and propulsion development—we use Veronte as our initial production baseline.
This approach allows our team to focus on system-level integration, aerodynamic maturation, and serial manufacturing for initial customer deliveries. Veronte provides a proven, airworthy foundation while we build operational flight hours and scale our production lines.
Once units are in service and serial manufacturing is steady, Apollyon develops its own flight-control core in-house, in parallel. Because our control laws, guidance algorithms, and envelope safety boundaries are already authored in our configuration packages, the in-house replacement will inherit a mature flight baseline. The replacement will be validated against the same hardware-in-the-loop test benches, verified through extensive flight testing, and formally qualified before transitioning onto fielded platforms.
| Phase | Baseline | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| First orders | Veronte Autopilot 1x · Apollyon packages | Scale, robustness and full-system integration |
| Steady production | Veronte in service · in-house baseline in development | Parallel development, HIL and flight testing of the replacement |
| After certification | In-house baseline | Transition platform by platform once qualified |
Supply continuity for the autopilot baseline is maintained through established vendor relationships across our partner network, as outlined in our supply chain strategy.
Platforms carrying this subsystem
Interfaces with: Robust flight control, Edge compute, GNSS-denied navigation.