EDGE, one of the world’s leading advanced technology and defence groups, has signed a Collaboration Agreement with the UAE’s Technology Innovation Institute (TII), a leading global institute for applied research and new-age technology; SteerAI, an off-road autonomous technology company developing autonomous driving and fleet management solutions; and Micropolis, a specialist robotics manufacturer, to pilot a project to deploy an autonomous logistics platform (ALP).
Designed to automate the movement of assets within and between manufacturing facilities, the platform will pair advanced, custom-built unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) with AI-driven software. The platform’s advanced features include fleet management, navigation and safety, digital twins, situational awareness, operational optimisation, advanced analytics, and enterprise integration.
The partnership aims to integrate complementary technologies from each organisation to deliver a fully integrated ALP. Micropolis will provide the core platform and UGV hardware in multiple variants (M1 and M2), tailored to different operational environments. SteerAI will deliver the command-and-control layer through its CoreConnect fleet management system, enabling operators to plan, execute, and oversee autonomous missions with UGV fleets via a single interface. TII will contribute advanced analytics and sovereign AI-driven situational awareness via TACTICAai, unifying data from sensors, domains, platforms, and systems to turn raw information into trusted, actionable insight.
The agreement, signed at the Unmanned Systems Exhibition (UMEX) and Simulation and Training Exhibition (SimTEX) 2026, marks a major milestone in advancing Emirati sovereign expertise in unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs), AI systems, and smart infrastructure. With EDGE’s overarching orchestration and integration expertise, the consortium is expected to deliver an end-to-end autonomous logistics solution that integrates hardware, AI, and software to enable resilient, scalable operations.
Bader Al Jaberi, Vice President for Industrialisation Technologies at EDGE BRIDGE, said: “As a catalyst for introducing emerging technologies into the UAE’s industrial defence hub, we are partnering with the UAE’s growing autonomous ecosystem to champion the development of advanced manufacturing systems. This Collaboration Agreement marks a significant step forward in our mission to build sovereign, end-to-end autonomous capabilities, from advanced research through to industrial-scale manufacturing.”
Dr Najwa Aaraj, CEO of TII, said: TACTICAai reflects our vision for next-generation situational awareness, where intelligence is no longer fragmented across sensors, domains, platforms, and systems. By orchestrating data, AI agents, and decision workflows into a single operational layer, TACTICAai enables operators to move from raw information to trusted, actionable insight. It continuously optimises operations by recommending response options that adapt to evolving conditions. In parallel, it embeds security analytics to detect anomalies and correlate threats across domains. The result is reduced decision time and operational risk, with resilient, sovereign AI that augments human judgement in complex environments while keeping humans in the loop.
Michael Sonderby, Acting CEO, SteerAI, said: “The real power of autonomous technology lies in aggregating and coordinating individual vehicles into fleets and integrating them with companies’ core systems. CoreConnect does exactly that: It works with any autonomous robot – ground, aerial or marine – and provides operators with centralised planning, execution, and oversight of complex autonomous operations. We look forward to collaborating on this initiative and using it as a model for rolling out autonomy at scale across the UAE.”
Fareed Aljawhari, CEO, Micropolis, said: “This collaboration marks a significant step towards building sovereign, end-to-end autonomous logistics capabilities in the UAE. By combining Micropolis’ expertise in autonomous ground platforms and industrial robotics with EDGE’s industrialisation leadership and TII’s advanced research in AI and autonomy, we aim to deliver scalable, production-ready autonomous logistics systems that operate reliably in complex industrial environments.”
