What sort of UCAV? It feels like something fairly high end and air-to-surface focused for which there isn't currently a competitor.
That's a fair question. Arguably BAE/MOD doesn't know the answer either.
Mantis was purely proof of concept; it did lead to the BAE/Dassault Telemos but in that died when France pulled out in favour of EADS Talarion - which itself went nowhere despite Turkish and South Korean interest (only lukewarm interest from the intended EU market). The RAF's Project Scavenger to replace Reaper to which Telemos was a contender morphed into Project Protector which led to Protector (Predator B) being selected in 2016.
The stealthy Corax, stated to have been a reconnaissance UAV seems to have sunk without trace post 2004.
Taranis was designed to enable the UK to maintain its sovereign aircraft and UAV/UCAV construction capability. Again, Anglo-French cooperation was going to tie in with Dassault nEUROn to form a European FCAS. Then everyone did a volte face (perhaps led by Dassault) and decided a manned 6th Gen fighter offered a much better FCAS solution (and much better sales kerching) - and thus Tempest and SCAF were born.
HERTI and Fury have promised much and been widely touted, HERTI was trialed in Afghanistan. But again, nothing has materialised since in terms of exports or UK users.
Most these were all mid-2000s-2010s projects and partly due to politics and partly due to changing definitions of what was required their success has been mixed. Since then it's been very quiet in terms of any new developments beyond continuing work on MAGMA. Clearly with Corax and Taranis BAE were aiming at the top-tier of UAV technology. And while perhaps Mantis could have given Protector/Predator a run for its money, it's clear than the mid-tier UAV market is crowded and a lot of nations find it within their grasp of national capabilities (Turkey ditched Talarion for example to go it alone). There probably isn't much future in this segment for BAE, especially when the RAF has already chosen a US system. Demon/MAGMA with its flapless research might indeed point to the future with US interest etc., it could be hugely important but again they might not be able to capitalise on the technology - or if they do we'll probably see the 'Star and Bars' on it first.
BAE didn't take part in the Lightweight Affordable Novel Combat Aircraft (LANCA)/Project Mosquito. The contract went to Spirit (Bombardier UK as was and Northrop Grumman UK) in 2019 after 4 years of concept studies initiated by the RAF Rapid Capabilities Office - which were presumably not "rapid" enough and in 2022 were shelved for other more "cost-effective" methods - whatever that means/is...
Since Tempest isn't due in service until 2035 it's open to question what UCAV (if any) might be partnered with it. Loyal wingmen tend to ebb and flow in popularity as the technology matures/fails to meet expectations in a cycle. Today they are waning in popularity but in 2-3 years' time there might be another boom with every Air Marshal/analyst telling us they are just around the corner.
Could BAE really reboot Taranis on its own without outside risk/funding partners? Could MAGMA be scaled up to Taranis size?
Project Vixen for the Royal Navy's carriers seems to remain in being, but things are very low key. In 2021 it was envisioned as being in service (or at least the catapults for it) by 2023-24, although at some stage it seems to have linked with Mosquito too which was a longer-term project, but there seems to have been little progress and again an off-the-shelf UAV seems the most likely solution.
As you say - who would have the deep pockets/need to purchase such a high-end UCAV? Well maybe the Arab states will want to boost their polyglot fighter fleets with polyglot UCAV fleets too? But I agree it's a niche market - which is why the 2010 UCAV FCAS idea died in favour of manned fighters. A but like Boom's struggle to get their supersonic airliner off the ground, the investors need to be convinced there is a market and at this moment that market isn't obvious.
