Beretta Defense Technologies (BDT), the parent company of the group of companies belonging to the Italian firearms manufacturer, has unveiled an automatic drone-defense turret with eight shotguns of the Benelli Drone Guardian type. These have been integrated into the LIVET weapons station of the also Italian electronics manufacturer Dualee. The system is set to be shown for the first time at this year’s Eurosatory defense fair in Paris from June 15 to 19.
The Benelli Drone Guardian is a drone-countering-optimized version of the semi-automatic Benelli M4, which had already been presented at Enforce Tac 2025. It is equipped with an “Advanced Impact” — short A.I. — barrel technology. A larger and longer cone and a new choke are intended to accelerate the shot pattern more effectively, giving it greater range and stopping power. Thus target engagements are reliably possible up to 50 meters and in the extreme case up to 100 meters.
Beretta combines Benelli with Norma and Steiner
Two barrel lengths are available—18.5 inches and 26 inches. The extended magazine tube holds seven standard 12/70 shells or six Magnum shotgun shells. The Norma AD-LER (Anti-Drone Long Effective Range) ammunition, which is exclusively available to military and governmental authorities, works as a buckshot load with tungsten pellets. It achieves a velocity of 405 m/s and a range of up to 100 meters. The Drone Guardian also includes a Steiner red dot sight, whose sight line is matched to the mechanical Ghost Ring sight.
Both Steiner Optics and Norma are part of the BDT corporate group as well. For use on the LIVET turret, optical aiming is, of course, not required. Rather, the weapon station is intended to automatically detect, track, and engage drones through sensors and software. According to Beretta, the system could be deployed on vehicles as well as for protecting stationary facilities. The shotgun-based solution is probably not as versatile as a turret with machine guns, but could be particularly cost-effective in terms of ammunition.
