The Hidden Economics of CUAS Procurement: What Buyers Miss When Cost Drives the Conversation

When budget dominates drone defence procurement decisions, effectiveness is often the casualty. Procurement teams across defence, aviation, and critical infrastructure face mounting pressure to secure airspace quickly, economically, and with minimal disruption. Yet drone defence is not a one-time acquisition. In fact, it is a long-term operational commitment that rarely fits neatly into conventional procurement cycles.

The real CUAS cost does not appear in the initial quote. It emerges later, when false positives erode trust or when systems fail to scale. In some cases, alerts leave response teams without a clear protocol. Eventually, this slows down incident resolution and also drives up costs through longer response times.

These overlooked CUAS operational costs are rarely factored into the tender stage. Hence, ignoring them leaves critical sites exposed. In this article, we will discuss why cost-led decisions often fail. Also, we'll explore what buyers can do differently to build effective, scalable drone defence systems

Procurement Pressures Create the Wrong Incentives 

CUAS procurement challenges often begin with an incident. A drone over a runway, a prison drop, or a nearby breach quickly puts airspace security in focus. Budgets are suddenly unlocked, but urgency often drives decisions that favor speed and visible CUAS costs over proper integration.

This urgency frequently leads to pitfalls in CUAS procurement. For instance, teams create "Requests for Proposal" with narrow parameters, where unit cost dominates vendor evaluation. As a result, detection capability is separated from response planning, and long-term scalability is often deferred to the future.

The outcome is predictable: solutions that perform convincingly in demonstrations but falter under operational strain. Many of these CUAS procurement mistakes stem from a limited framing of the problem. 

Detecting an object is only the beginning. The real measure of CUAS effectiveness is in verifying it, escalating appropriately, and sustaining situational awareness across shifting conditions. Responding reactively rather than proactively only deepens the flaws in the CUAS procurement process. It leaves critical sites vulnerable at precisely the wrong time.

The Hidden Costs No One Budgets For

The most consequential hidden costs of CUAS programmes do not appear in procurement spreadsheets. They become visible only once operations begin. Training burdens are a prime example of this. When solutions lack intuitive interfaces or overwhelm operators with unverified alerts, turnover rises and effectiveness falls.

This is one of the CUAS procurement challenges most often underestimated during early scoping. False positives are another recurring burden. Persistent misidentification of birds, balloons, or other benign objects undermines trust in the system and delays genuine responses. The gap between detection and escalation is another overlooked factor.

Many systems only record alerts but do not respond to them. This happens when there is no human involved or no clear connection to current systems. Over time, these flaws add to CUAS operational costs that far exceed the initial drone defence procurement budgets. Inflexible architecture compounds the issue. Non-modular deployments may appear cost-effective at the outset but become expensive to adapt as threats evolve. 

Adding optical sensors, scaling across sites, or integrating with wider systems is often prohibitively costly. These CUAS procurement mistakes are carried by departments that were not part of the original CUAS procurement process, from operations to safety and compliance, where the cumulative burden is only recognised too late.

Cost-Sharing Models That Are Emerging

In aviation, some airports are beginning to rethink how drone defence procurement is funded. Instead of expecting one department or agency to cover all CUAS costs, stakeholders are sharing the responsibility. They are focusing on those who are most affected. This model recognises that disruption impacts far more than one team.

For instance, airlines incur delayed flights and reputational damage, and ANSPs are accountable for safe skies. Henceforth, the airport security teams must coordinate the on-site response. Heathrow offers an example where CUAS coverage has extended far beyond the terminal.

Small drones near runways can trigger delays, inspections, or evacuations, creating costs that no single operator can manage alone. In some cases, airlines and ANSPs have supported enhancements together. They treat CUAS as shared infrastructure critical to trust and continuity.

This approach shows a growing trend. Industries are sharing CUAS costs. Organizations now see drone defense as a necessary ongoing investment, not a one-time expense. Lessons from other sites reinforce that CUAS procurement pitfalls often stem from ignoring the broader circle of stakeholders most impacted by disruption.

What Buyers Can Do Differently

The CUAS procurement process is shaped by the frameworks. These frameworks are often rigid, rushed, and blind to operational complexity. Yet buyers can shift the conversation by anchoring requirements in outcomes rather than specifications. Instead of focusing on how many drones a system can detect, the question should be what happens after detection.

Does the solution integrate with existing surveillance or perimeter intrusion tools? Can it escalate in a timely, reliable way? Evaluating the total cost of ownership rather than the headline CUAS cost is another vital step. Factoring in training, maintenance, false alert management, licensing, and upgrade potential over the years helps understand a truer picture of CUAS operational costs.

Involving all relevant departments early in the drone defence procurement process reduces the risk of CUAS procurement mistakes later on. Testing should extend beyond controlled demonstrations, exposing CUAS solutions to cluttered sites, difficult terrain, and non-library drones.

The evaluation criteria should also include service and integration support. Questions around diagnostics, adaptability, and post-deployment support matter as much as long-range detection. As EUROCONTROL’s Drone Incident Management guide and EASA’s Counter-UAS recommendations emphasise, effectiveness is as much about coordination and response as it is about the underlying technology.

Conclusion: A Shift from Cost to Capability

CUAS is a capability that spans detection, verification, escalation, and response. As mentioned, procurement spreadsheets do not show the real cost of CUAS. However, the costs are revealed in operational disruptions, missed threats, and public exposure.

Buyers who treat CUAS procurement as a short-term, cost-focused task risk repeating the same mistakes that have exposed other sites. By reframing drone defence procurement around operational outcomes and recognising the weight of CUAS operational costs, stakeholders can build systems that last beyond a budget cycle. In the end, the most expensive deployment is the one that fails when you need it most.