TROIA, Portugal. NATO’s Allied Command Transformation has wrapped up GLOW 2025, the third step in its year-long Innovation Continuum. This effort is designed to speed up the journey from new ideas to practical tools, moving through planning, testing, and live demonstrations.
GLOW serves as a major checkpoint in this process. It gives NATO, allied nations, industry partners, and universities the chance to push innovation forward together. The goal is to keep the Alliance ahead of fast-changing threats while strengthening its technological edge and operational flexibility.
The event took place last week at the Portuguese Navy’s Operational Experimentation Centre in Troia, alongside the integration phase of Robotic Experimentation and Prototyping with Maritime Unmanned System (REPMUS). It brought together 150 participants from 13 nations, NATO organizations, private industry, and academic institutions. This stage focused on integrating and refining solutions before the final showcase, known as SHINE, which will be held in Istanbul next month.
A key accomplishment of GLOW was the testing and “de-risking” of 70 solutions and four larger operational experiments. These included new ways to defend against glide bombs, neutralize wired drones, clear naval mines, strengthen encryption in the post-quantum era, and protect critical undersea infrastructure.
The four headline experiments were:
- Next Generation Intelligence and Surveillance – Six nations (France, Italy, Norway, Türkiye, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America) and eight companies compared new technologies with traditional, human-driven methods, involving more than 25 participants.
- Cross-Domain Command Concept – Two nations(Türkiye and the United Kingdom) and two companies tested new models for coordinating military operations across land, maritime, air, space, and cyberspace domains.
- Emerging and Disruptive Technologies in Operations – Poland, in conjunction with one company, and representatives from operational headquarters, explored how cutting-edge tools affect military planning and execution.
- Cognitive Impact of Artificial Intelligence – Three companies from France, the United Kingdom, and the United States, with eight supporting experts, examined how AI influences decision-making for operators and commanders.
Together, these experiments showed how NATO links innovation with real-world needs, stress-testing ideas in realistic settings to ensure readiness for tomorrow’s challenges.
As the Innovation Continuum Lead, Krzysztof Skurzak, explained: “Start small and finish big represents the philosophy of the Innovation Continuum. At GLOW, ideas have become real solutions—validated and ready to be tested in the toughest conditions.”
With GLOW complete, focus now shifts to SHINE 2025, which will take place next month in Istanbul. There, the refined solutions will be demonstrated in military-relevant scenarios, marking the conclusion of this year’s Innovation Continuum and underscoring NATO’s ability to transform innovation into practical capability.
