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WDS 2026: KAI Positions FA-50 Light Combat Aircraft with AAP Drones in Close Formation Teaming Concept.
Korea Aerospace Industries showcased a 1:10 scale FA-50 light combat aircraft flying in close formation with its Adaptable Aerial Platform drones at the World Defense Show in Riyadh. The display underscored how manned-unmanned teaming is becoming central to affordable airpower strategies in contested environments.
At the World Defense Show in Riyadh, Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) used a tightly choreographed scale display to frame a broader message about manned–unmanned teaming: a 1:10 FA-50 light combat aircraft model shown in “flight” alongside KAI’s Adaptable Aerial Platform (AAP) drones in a close formation. The arrangement, staged as an airborne vignette rather than a static product pedestal, visually links KAI’s export-proven light fighter to the company’s ongoing work on autonomous and attritable airborne systems, a pairing increasingly central to how air forces discuss affordability, mass, and survivability in contested airspace.
At the World Defense Show in Riyadh, Korea Aerospace Industries staged a suspended scale formation of its FA 50 light combat aircraft and Adaptable Aerial Platform drones to spotlight its push into manned-unmanned teaming (Picture Source: Army Recognition Group)
World Defense Show is Saudi Arabia’s large international defence exhibition held in Riyadh and founded under the Kingdom’s defence-industrial framework, with an emphasis on bringing together global defence manufacturers and government stakeholders across air, land, sea, space and security domains. The event is positioned as part of Saudi Arabia’s wider industrial and localisation ambitions under Vision 2030, and the show’s organisers already point to the next edition scheduled for 2026.
The centrepiece of KAI’s display is the FA-50, presented as a fully armed configuration at 1:10 scale. Even at reduced size, the model highlights the aircraft’s external-store flexibility, one of the reasons the FA-50 has remained attractive in markets looking for a bridge between advanced training and frontline combat roles. KAI markets the FA-50 as a supersonic light combat aircraft with a 20 mm cannon and a weapons catalogue that can include air-to-air missiles and precision-guided air-to-ground munitions, depending on customer configuration and integration standards.
A close reading of the display underlines what KAI likely wanted visitors to notice first: the “armed” look is deliberate and legible. The model carries multiple stores across the wings and centreline, with a wingtip air-to-air missile shape visible and additional underwing loads that visually cue multi-role use rather than a clean-airframe training posture. The aircraft is mounted on a curved support that holds it at a slight nose-up attitude, reinforcing the impression of speed and climb. The cockpit canopy is depicted in a tandem arrangement, consistent with the FA-50’s trainer lineage, and the overall finish uses a subdued grey scheme that reads as operational rather than demonstrator-bright.
The supporting actors are the AAP vehicles, placed slightly below and ahead of the FA-50 on thin vertical poles, mimicking an escort screen. In the image, two dark, compact aircraft labelled “AAP” are positioned as if they are “flying” with the manned jet, and a third is partially visible at the far left edge of the frame, suggesting a small formation package rather than a single adjunct drone. Their airframe form is intentionally simple and “drone-like”, emphasising function over signature aesthetics: small fuselage, modest wing planform, and a tail with visible branding, making them easy to read at a glance as unmanned teammates rather than missiles or decoys.
Beyond the show-floor display, AAP is increasingly used by KAI as a tangible testbed for autonomy and collaborative operations concepts. Reporting in 2025 described KAI conducting autonomous flight tests of an AAP using an artificial-intelligence pilot system, signalling that the programme is not limited to conceptual graphics but is tied to real flight experimentation. In parallel, industry reporting has framed AAP as part of a broader two-tier manned–unmanned teaming concept in which smaller platforms can be controlled or coordinated within larger cooperative packages, ultimately linked to a manned fighter such as the FA-50 or KF-21.
Seen through that lens, the Riyadh display is less about a single aircraft model and more about a mission-system narrative: the FA-50 as the crewed node with sensors, weapons authority and connectivity, and AAP as a modular unmanned companion that can be adapted for different roles as doctrine evolves. KAI has not publicly standardised one “AAP mission set” across all markets, but the logic behind showcasing it in formation is clear: unmanned teammates can extend coverage, complicate adversary targeting, and provide additional options for reconnaissance, decoying, electronic support, or strike support, while keeping the crewed aircraft focused on decision-making and weapons employment. By choosing the FA-50 for this concept staging, KAI also anchors the autonomy discussion to a platform already familiar to many air forces evaluating affordable fighter capacity and upgrade paths.
The display also suggests how KAI wants the discussion to progress with prospective buyers in the Middle East: not only “what the FA-50 can carry”, but “what package the FA-50 could lead”. This matters in a region where air forces often balance high-end fleets with cost-effective force expansion, and where interest in unmanned systems is rising alongside counter-UAS and integrated air defence priorities. A formation display provides a simple visual shorthand for a future air package: a manned fighter with loyal or attritable unmanned assets operating forward, distributing risk and workload.
KAI’s World Defense Show presentation used an intentionally cinematic 1:10 scale tableau, an armed FA-50 “in flight” with multiple AAP drones, to communicate a transition already visible across global airpower planning: shifting from platform-centric acquisition to package-centric capability, where a fighter’s value is increasingly defined by the systems and unmanned teammates it can command, integrate, and fight with. By pairing the FA-50 with AAP in a formation scene, KAI positioned its light combat aircraft not only as an export fighter, but as a potential lead node for collaborative combat concepts that it is actively exploring through autonomy testing and adaptable unmanned platforms.