Who would have thought a zoologist could solve an aeronautical problem?

Our visit to Qinetiq in Hampshire on 5th April 2017 was very interesting for Director of Innovation Luca Corradi and CEO Colette Cohen.

The cross-industry focus at this former Ministry of Defence organisation (privatised in 2001) has produced some incredible technologies, such as using knowledge of a butterfly’s wing reflecting light to make aircraft wings invisible to radar.

“An aeronautical engineer would never have come up with that,” Luca Corradi said. “And then this way of tricking radar has been transported to offshore wind to enable windfarm construction in areas that were previously off-limits due to proximity to airport radar systems”

Colette and Luca spent several hours with the Advanced Services and Products department, discussing how they approach research and development and how they can apply military solutions to the civil sector.

“For me it was really exciting to see this approach in action and to get the confirmation that it works,” Luca said.

QinetiQ is a company of scientists and engineers working to research, experiment, test and evaluate solutions for sovereign capability. We look forward to learning more about them and are already planning a second visit with some of our Solution Centre Managers to explore new solutions to the Industry challenges.