DRDO Floats SHIELD, an Indigenous Rig to Find Out Exactly How Microwaves Kill Drone Electronics

DRDO has issued a Request for Proposal for an S-Band High-Power Microwave Integrated Evaluation System for Lethality and Damage — codenamed SHIELD — inviting Indian industry, including startups and MSMEs, to build a testing platform rather than a deployable weapon.

An Evaluation Rig, Not a Weapon

The distinction matters. India already has counter-drone programmes aimed at neutralising hostile UAVs in the field. SHIELD is something narrower and, in some ways, more foundational: a controlled system that fires S-band high-power microwave (HPM) radiation at electronic targets so DRDO can precisely measure how much energy it takes to disable or destroy different categories of equipment — communication gear, sensors, control systems and other electronics that Indian and adversary drones alike depend on. Without that lethality data, DRDO cannot properly design, calibrate or certify an actual deployable HPM weapon, since engineers would be guessing at the power levels and exposure times needed to guarantee a kill against real-world hardened electronics.

The Technical Ask

The RFP calls for a system built around Gallium Nitride (GaN)-based Solid State Power Amplifier technology, the same wide-bandgap semiconductor material increasingly used in radar transmit-receive modules because of its high power density and resilience under sustained thermal and electrical stress. DRDO wants the evaluation rig to achieve a peak electric field strength of at least 3 kV/m in the far field — a specification that gives industry bidders a concrete performance bar rather than a vague capability statement. The system is also required to be modular and scalable, so it can be reconfigured across different test scenarios and, potentially, evolve into higher-power variants without a full redesign.

Funded Through the Technology Development Fund

SHIELD is being pursued under DRDO's Technology Development Fund (TDF) scheme, the vehicle DRDO uses to route development contracts to private industry — including startups and MSMEs — rather than building capability entirely in-house at its own laboratories. TDF-funded projects typically require the winning bidder to take a system from concept through a working prototype within a fixed timeline, with DRDO providing partial funding and technical oversight. Opening the SHIELD tender to smaller private players continues a pattern DRDO has leaned on across recent electronic-warfare and directed-energy programmes, betting that startups can iterate on GaN power-amplifier design faster than the state-run defence-electronics majors that have historically built India's radar and jamming systems.

Part of a Broader Directed-Energy Push

SHIELD lands alongside a wider Indian effort to build directed-energy and high-power microwave capability as a counter to the drone swarms that have reshaped modern conflict, from Ukraine's front lines to South Asia's own recent skirmishes. DRDO has separately disclosed plans for "Surya," a 300 kW directed-energy laser weapon with a stated 20 km engagement range targeted for around 2027, aimed at neutralising aerial threats kinetically rather than electronically. HPM systems like the one SHIELD is meant to evaluate work differently from laser weapons — instead of physically burning through a target, they induce damaging electrical currents in a target's internal circuitry, which makes them potentially effective against swarms of multiple small drones simultaneously rather than one target at a time, since a single microwave pulse can illuminate an entire area rather than requiring precise laser tracking of each individual UAV.

Why the Testing Infrastructure Matters

India's counter-drone posture has become a stated priority following repeated cross-border drone incursions and the broader lesson, drawn from conflicts elsewhere, that cheap commercial and militarised drones can overwhelm traditional air-defence systems built for larger, faster, more expensive threats. But fielding an effective HPM weapon requires more than a working transmitter — it requires empirical lethality data showing exactly what field strength, frequency and exposure duration reliably disables specific classes of drone electronics without wasting energy on overkill. SHIELD is DRDO's attempt to build that empirical foundation domestically, rather than relying on lethality models drawn from foreign literature that may not reflect the electronics actually found in the drones India expects to face.

Sources

• DRDO Floats SHIELD Programme To Build Indigenous Microwave System For Testing Drone Vulnerabilities — Free Press Journal
• DRDO Launches SHIELD Program To Build S-Band High-Power Microwave Evaluation System — Indian Defence News
• DRDO Launches SHIELD Programme to Develop S-Band High-Power Microwave Evaluation System — SSBCrack
• India's SHIELD: Developing GaN Solid-State High-Power Microwave Weapons for Electronics Protection — Asianet Newsable