Cohere Technologies has landed a $28 million contract from the US Department of War’s FutureG Office to build a prototype radio access network that can spot drones using the same infrastructure that carries everyday cellular traffic.
TMN readers will know Cohere Technologies for two things, both of which exploit the company’s deep understanding of how wireless signals as a result of its development of the OTFS waveform.
First is its Universal Spectrum Multiplier software, which uses Delay-Doppler calculations to create more accurate channel estimation calculations, thereby making spectrum usage more efficient in multi-user MIMO cell sites. This technology has been through Vodafone trials and is now in performance tests with Bell Canada alongside a major wireless network equipment manufacturer.
The second and more recent line is Cohere’s development of an Integrated Sensing and Communications (ISAC) capability that it calls Pulsone.
It is this capability that has received the Government funding to develop a Radio Access Network (RAN) that does double duty, ferrying data while also acting as a radar, by using the OTFS waveform over ordinary commercial spectrum to detect and track aerial threats.
Cohere argues that the Zak-OTFS waveform has a structural advantage over standard OFDM when it comes to sensing: it encodes information directly in the Delay-Doppler domain rather than time-frequency, which Cohere says translates into better performance in high-Doppler scenarios – exactly the kind of environment a fast-moving drone swarm creates.
The proposal is that instead of building dedicated military sensing hardware, the proposed system could repurpose existing or future 5G/6G cell sites – and do it in a way adversaries can’t distinguish from normal network traffic.
Riding OTFS into the sensing domain
Tom Rondeau, Principal Director for FutureG at OUSW(R&E), framed the award as a case of moving fast on a pressing capability gap. “ISAC is a mission-first priority for the U.S. Department of War to defend against drone swarms,” Rondeau said, adding that leadership’s push to execute rapidly meant the office needed “a partner with the right technology ready today.”
Cohere chairman and CEO Ray Dolan said the deal was validation of the company’s dual-use strategy, pairing Pulsone with conventional OFDM in what he described as a flexible, software-defined architecture aimed at keeping costs down while staying operationally covert.
What’s actually getting built
Cohere Technologies will not be working alone on the programme which will require partners from the defence, RAN and silicon sectors. It also described the programme timeline as “aggressive”.
The scope of work reads like a comprehensive sensing stack including:
- A multi-waveform physical layer that runs both legacy 4G/5G OFDM and Pulsone/Zak-OTFS on the same open software stack
- A mobile test platform for bi-static and multi-static sensing setups
- A “Layered Inference Sensing” system to turn raw delay-Doppler data into real-time 3D tracks, complete with classification and confidence scoring
- Outdoor test environments covering mono-static, bi-static, and multi-static configurations
- Alignment with the FutureG Office’s Open Centralized Unit/Distributed Unit (OCUDU) platform and Zero Trust security requirements
OCUDU is overseen by the Linux Foundation-hosted OCUDU Ecosystem Foundation, which is trying to build a production-ready open source CU/DU stack that the DoW and industry can both build on.
Beyond the battlefield
While the immediate use case is counter-drone defence — plus battlefield awareness, border security, and critical infrastructure protection — Cohere and the FutureG Office are also eyeing commercial spillover: Advanced Air Mobility traffic management, smart-city applications, and public safety are all named as potential adjacent markets, continuing the dual-use framing the Pentagon has increasingly favoured for next-gen wireless R&D.
For Cohere, the award marks a significant vote of confidence in OTFS as a sensing waveform, not just a communications one — and gives the company a marquee government reference deployment as it continues pitching Pulsone into both defense and commercial 5G/6G conversations.
