Skapa by Saab Celebrates Action-Packed First Year
In just one year, Saab’s Skapa team has already made waves with transformational technology development across the defense and security industries.
In April 2024, Saab launched Skapa by Saab. This bold new venture is more than an initiative; it is an operationally focused incubator that accelerates developing and deploying cutting-edge solutions for global defense and security challenges. Comprised of a growing roster of industry-leading experts with diverse backgrounds across military, academia, government, and startups, the team has already made significant contributions in autonomy, responsible AI and all domain awareness.
“At Skapa, we have assembled a world-class team of innovators and creators with a singular focus of advancing mission-critical solutions that keep people and society safe. We are already delivering on nine contracts across the Department of Defense, rapidly solving complex operational challenges with precision, agility and impact,” said Michael Brasseur, Saab, Inc.’s chief strategy officer and general manager of Skapa.
Skapa One Year Highlights
Over the past year, the Skapa team’s efforts have led to several research breakthroughs and innovative technological integrations, alongside major developments in the ethical use of AI.
Enforcer 3 Naval Testbed Forms International Research Partnership
The Enforcer 3, developed in Sweden as a joint collaboration between different parts of Saab, has been transformed into a fully autonomous, multi-mission research vessel that enables cross-continental research and development of emerging technologies.
The Enforcer 3 project operates with two mirror vessels in San Diego and Sweden, creating a global research loop that enables rapid progress and innovation, resulting in the quick deployment of Autonomous Ocean Core, developed in Sweden, and Saab’s Computer Vision Platform (SCVP). This allows users to collect data, annotate it, train a computer vision model and deploy it for real-time video inference on five simultaneous video streams.
Autonomous Ocean Core (AOC) Makes U.S. Debut
Saab’s Autonomous Ocean Core is a versatile control system that enables un-crewed and autonomous naval systems to work safely and predictably—on the surface and underwater.
By conducting global research in collaboration with Saab’s Swedish counterparts as well as partnering with industry leaders ANELLO, Hidden Level, Microsoft, Mythos AI and Second Front, Saab successfully demonstrated Autonomous Ocean Core integrated with the capabilities of our partners aboard the Enforcer 3 at the WEST 2025 conference in January.
The demonstration showcased the possible cutting-edge capabilities available for unmanned surface vessels and other uncrewed platforms that provide customers with an increased tactical edge and safe and reliable autonomous operations.
Skapa team leads ASIMOV contract to develop responsible AI benchmarks
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) awarded a contract to Saab and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to contribute to the Autonomy Standards and Ideals with Military Operational Values (ASIMOV) program.
The ASIMOV program seeks to create a platform to automate the process of benchmarking autonomous systems for alignment against prescribed principles and norms. The platform provides a foundation for evaluating the ethical dimensions of autonomy within the context of military operational values.
To address the program goals, the Skapa–MIT team is developing the RESPECT (Responsible Ethical Standards for Pioneering Effective Combat Technologies) framework. This framework relies on a Large Language Model (LLM)-guided simulation environment that iteratively creates scenarios with varying degrees of ethical and performance difficulty. Autonomous systems are stress tested in the simulation environment and scored based on their performance along ethical and operational dimensions.
Saab Launches The Skapa Podcast: Creating the Future
As an innovation incubator, Skapa’s team is dedicated to bringing people together from across industry, academia, government and start-ups to explore the cutting-edge of technological potential.
To further this goal, Saab launched The Skapa Podcast: Creating the Future, which invites visionary leaders across industries to share their ideal future, unbound by current constraints. The podcast explores what it would take to turn these visions into reality—discussing the necessary innovations, strategic shifts, and collaborative efforts to bring about transformative change in defense and security.
Guests on the podcast include astronaut and Saab Chief Innovation Officer Michael Wandt, CEO of the Krach Institute for Tech Diplomacy at Purdue University Michelle Giuda, Swedish Minister of Defense Pål Jonson, and many more!
Listen to the podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube to learn more about Skapa and the future of defense.
Looking Ahead
In the days and years ahead, the Skapa team is excited to continue its rapid progress towards accelerating Saab’s development of transformative technology for the defense industry. Much good lies ahead.