International Defence Excellence and Security Symposium

IDEaS

International DEFENCE EXCELLENCE and SECURITY SYMPOSIUM (IDEaS)

8 September 2025

EUROCONTROL headquarter, Brussels, Belgium

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The International Defence and Security (IDEaS) Symposium is an Annual Event. It brings together innovation ecosystem partners from Government, Industry, and Academia to exchange ideas and information and to foster connections and collaborations among Defence and Security decision-makers, Academic experts, and Industry capability developers. The 3rd IDEaS Symposium is associated with the NATO Joint Capability Group UAS Fall meetings in 2025. It aims to share, discuss, and demonstrate concepts and technologies of trustworthy teaming between human and artificial intelligence (AI) -enabled autonomy for effective command and control (C2) decision-making with the context of design, development, and deployment of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UASs). Topics include the new NATO Autonomy STANREC and new Autonomy Task Force, and Community of Interest in Autonomy.

Human-Autonomy Teaming for UAS Design, Development, and Deployment

With its ubiquitous application and transformative potential, AI holds the promise of delivering both incremental and profound changes in many aspects of our society including military operations. However, AI (or automation or machine intelligence more broadly) is not a silver bullet for eliminating human errors when information processing and timely decision-making demands exceed the capacity of human operators. Many AI-enabled systems such as UASs operate in environments that are not specifiable a priori. Further, there will always be environments (e.g., for missile and air defense operations) in which data come from multiple sources, including new or partially unreliable ones, and where the integrity of data sources and AI processes and outputs cannot be fully trusted. The problem of trustworthy AI and thus human-autonomy teaming (HAT) is complex and multidimensional and it is largely dependent on both effective human-machine interaction and robust, reliable AI systems. To achieve the full HAT potential for C2 operations, there is the need for mutual trust between human operators and AI-enabled decision aids in the context of wide area surveillance, advanced training systems, and after-action analysis, etc. With such trusted partnership, a persistent and reliable HAT decision support capability will help enable and ensure HAT capabilities and thus achieve information dominance and decision superiority.

 
The specific objective of this symposium is to share, discuss, and demonstrate innovative concepts, methodologies, and technologies as potential solutions to address trustworthy issues in HAT for effective decision-making. Progresses in the development of the new NATO Autonomy STANREC, the newly formed Autonomy Task Force, and the Community of Interest in Autonomy will be reported and discussed at the event. This is an invitation to stakeholders in academics, defence research institutions, industrial and commercial organizations, and the military to attend and/or offer ideas and experience in the development of requirements, methodologies, and technologies of trustworthy HAT for effective C2 decision-making and training for UAS design, development, and deployment. 

Keynote and invited speakers

IDEaS 2025 Speakers.

General Co-Chairs

  • Saeid Nahavandi, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia
  • Dr. Ming Hou, Department of National Defence, Canada
  • Edgar Reuber, Principal Advisor – Head of CMC/SBM, EUROCONTROL
  • LCDR Joseph W Geeseman, United States Navy, USA

Program Co-Chairs

  • Anneloes Maij, Manager Cerebro – Royal NLR – Netherlands Aerospace Centre
  • Max Friedrich, German Aerospace Center

International Technical Committee

  • Professor Rodney Roberts, Florida State University, USA
  • Professor Abdollah Ebbie Homaifar, North Carolina A&T State University, USA
  • Professor Henry Leung, University of Calgary, Canada
  • Professor Anthony A. Maciejewski, Colorado State University, USA
  • Professor Mehrdad Saif, University of Windsor, Canada
  • Professor Stefan Wolfgang Pickl, University of the Bundeswehr Munich , Germany
  • LCdr Adam Bradly, Medical Service Corps, United States Navy
  • Jessie Chen, United states Army Research Laboratory, USA
  • Maj David Dunwoody, Office of the Secretary to the Governor General, Canadian Armed Forces
  • LCdr Joseph W Geeseman, Medical Service Corps, United States Navy
  • Dr. Ming Hou, Defence Research and Development Canada
  • A. Anneloes Maiji, Royal NLR – Netherlands Aerospace Centre, the Netherlands
  • Professor Saeid Nahavandi, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia
  • LCol Edgar Reuber, EUROCONTROL and German Air Force
  • Dale Richards, Thales, United Kingdom