MGI Engineering announces high-speed autonomous collaborative combat aircraft, MGI T-022 Vortex

MGI Engineering Ltd (MGI) has today announced the launch of the T-022 Vortex, a new class of autonomous combat aircraft that redefines what affordable air power looks like and is aimed at the recently announced UK Storm Fighter requirement.

Designated MGI T-022, Vortex is the first UK-built Autonomous Collaborative Platform (ACP) of its kind.

It is an aircraft that flies without a pilot on board, operates intelligently, and is designed from the outset to work alongside crewed jets as part of a coordinated team.

The launch follows MGI's recent successful testing of its deep-strike TigerShark programme, as part of the MOD's Project BRAKESTOP.

Where previous autonomous platforms have been optimised for either range or payload, T-022 Vortex does both, at near-supersonic speed. At 3,500 kg maximum take-off weight, with a range exceeding 4,000 kilometres and a top speed approaching Mach 0.85 (roughly 1,050 km/h, or just under the speed of sound), Vortex's performance is on-par with crewed-only fast jets.

Powered by a Rolls Royce Orpheus engines, or similar powerplants, delivering 12–16 kilonewtons of thrust, it can carry up to 1,000 kg of payload across four weapon or sensor stations, both internally and externally, at costs between £3 and £6 million per aircraft depending on fit.

Redefining how air power works

T-022 Vortex is engineered specifically for manned-unmanned teaming, known in the sector as MUM-T.

This is the ability for a single crewed aircraft, such as a Typhoon or F-35, to direct multiple T-022 Vortex CAP platforms simultaneously as autonomous wingmen, while sharing sensor data, responding to dynamic mission changes, and executing coordinated tasks without a ground operator in the loop for every decision.

In contested airspace where communications may be jammed or disrupted, T-022 Vortex is designed to continue operating intelligently and independently.

This places T-022 Vortex squarely within the UK's recently announced Autonomous Collaborative Platforms programme, a Ministry of Defence-backed initiative to develop affordable, AI supported uncrewed aircraft that extend the reach and lethality of the RAF's crewed force.

Mike Gascoyne, CEO of MGI Engineering, said: "Vortex is the logical next step in the journey we've been on since SkyShark and TigerShark. This isn't an experiment, it is a fully capable collaborative combat aircraft, engineered at a price point that makes it possible to field at genuine scale. That changes the economics of air power, and it changes the risk calculus. You can put Vortex into the most dangerous environments without putting a pilot there with it."

T-022 Vortex's performance specifications reflect the demands of high-intensity peer conflict.

With an operating altitude range of 20 metres to 12,000 metres, a manoeuvrability envelope from -2g to +7g, and a cruise speed of Mach 0.71, it is credible across a wide range of mission profiles. From intelligence gathering and electronic warfare to strike and suppression of enemy air defences.

At 11 metres in length with a 7.6-metre wingspan, T-022 Vortex is comparable in physical size to a light combat aircraft. Its 400 kg internal payload bay and four external mounting points, two under the wings, two on the fuselage, allow operators to configure the aircraft to mission requirements, whether that means sensors, weapons, jamming equipment, or a combination.

Vortex Family joins MGI's growing family of autonomous air platforms, which includes the SkyShark short-range one-way effector, TigerShark long-range deep-strike cruise missile, both now in active development for delivery, and complimented by the Ultra Low-Cost development ACP platform LeopardShark, developed from a reusable version of the Tigershark platform.

Together, these four platforms give defence customers a scalable, affordable autonomous air capability across short, medium, and long-range mission sets.