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irARM™ at HEMUS 2026: Thermal Imaging Comes Home to Plovdiv
- Blog
Author
Ivaylo Stoyanov
PhD in Optics, is an expert in the field of gun scopes and thermal optics with years of experience and numerous publications in academic journals.
- June 5, 2026
Field Report // HEMUS 2026 // Plovdiv, Bulgaria
This week the irARM™ team is on the exhibition floor at HEMUS 2026, the international defence, antiterrorism and security exhibition staged at the International Fair Plovdiv from 3 to 6 June. For a Bulgarian thermal imaging manufacturer, there is no more fitting place to be. HEMUS is where the country's defence industry, its armed forces, government institutions and international partners gather under one roof, and this year we brought our full lineup of thermal scopes, OEM thermal cores and night vision systems to meet them face to face.
What follows is part field report, part introduction. If you stopped by our stand, thank you. If you did not, here is a look at what we showed, who we are, and why a heat-seeing sensor company belongs squarely in the conversation that HEMUS 2026 is built around.
Bulgaria's Premier Defence Exhibition, Three Decades Strong
HEMUS - a name that stands for Highly Efficient Military Unified Systems - has been held in Plovdiv since 1994, which makes the 2026 edition more than three decades in the making. It is the largest Bulgarian international defence and security exhibition, and it runs under the auspices of the Ministry of Defence, the Ministry of Economy and Industry, and the Ministry of Innovation and Growth, organised by the HEMUS-95 Foundation together with the Plovdiv International Fair and the Bulgarian Defence Industry Association.
The thematic focus reads almost like a brief for what we build. HEMUS 2026 centres on defence, counterterrorism and security, with particular emphasis on cyber security, border security, strategic communications, and autonomous systems for observation, information, tracking and response. Layer on an industrial forum, an international scientific conference, and the always-popular live firing demonstrations, and you have one of the most important security platforms in this part of Europe. As the organisers put it, it is an event where West and East match interests.
// HEMUS 2026 at a glance
- Event
- International Defence Equipment & Services Exhibition "HEMUS 2026"
- Dates
- 3 - 6 June 2026 (first day for invited guests; trade access from 4 June)
- Venue
- International Fair Plovdiv, 37 "Tsar Boris III" Blvd, Plovdiv, Bulgaria
- Focus
- Defence, antiterrorism, security, border & cyber security, autonomous surveillance
- Auspices
- Ministries of Defence, Economy & Industry, and Innovation & Growth
- Organiser
- HEMUS-95 Foundation, with Plovdiv International Fair & the Bulgarian Defence Industry Association
- Find us
- Hall 6, Booth 6-A-5
Who Is irARM™?
irARM™ designs and builds high-quality thermal scopes, thermal cores and night vision systems for hunters, outdoor professionals, law enforcement and security users. We are, at our core, an engineering company: the difference between a usable thermal image and a great one lives in the algorithms, and that image processing is where we put our energy. The result is imagery that stays clear, stable and useful across the full range of real-world conditions, day or night, through darkness, smoke, fog and foliage. Our promise is simple enough to fit on the stand: see it, aim it, shoot it.
Over the years that focus has earned irARM a reputation as a dependable, trusted option in thermal imaging. Customers consistently single out the same three things: the clarity and range of the optics, the build quality and durability of the hardware, and responsive after-sales support backed by a two-year warranty. We are proud that a home-grown Bulgarian brand is mentioned in the same breath as far larger names, and HEMUS 2026 is exactly the stage where that recognition is built.
Thermal sees what the eye cannot: heat, not light. That is precisely the edge HEMUS 2026 is built around.
What We Brought to the Floor
We came to Plovdiv with the complete picture, from finished sighting systems you can pick up and look through, to the bare thermal cores that integrators design into their own platforms. Four product families anchored the stand.
01 / Hawk Thermal Scope Line
The Hawk line is our flagship riflescope family, offered in 320 and 640 detector classes. The Hawk 640 delivers up to 4x optical magnification and up to 8x digital zoom on a crisp Quad-VGA FLCOS display running at 60 Hz, with on-screen graphics, a graphic compass and shot counter, built-in Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, and an iOS and Android app for streaming, recording and sharing footage. Up to four hours of runtime and a two-year warranty round it out. The Hawk 320 brings the same DNA to a sharper price point with up to 8x optical magnification.
320 & 640 detectorsQuad-VGA FLCOS 60 HzBluetooth + Wi-FiiOS / Android app2-year warranty
02 / MINI Thermal Scope Line
For users who want serious capability without the bulk, the MINI line packs a lot into a compact body. The 320-Mini pairs a 320 x 240, 12 um detector with USB and Wi-Fi video streaming, on-screen controls, a graphic shot counter and compass, guided reticles and an external battery option - a genuinely pocketable thermal sight built for the field.
03 / ThruVision Thermal Cores & OEM
This is where a lot of HEMUS visitors leaned in. Our ThruVision thermal cores come in 320, 640 and 1280 formats - LWIR sensors covering the 8 to 14 um band with a 12 um pixel pitch, a built-in shutter with flat-field correction, adjustable image orientation, video and still recording, integrated Wi-Fi and USB streaming, and a wide operating range from -40 to +85 C. They are designed to be integrated: dropped into handheld monoculars, weapon sights, drone payloads, vehicle systems and fixed surveillance installations.
For an integrator building the autonomous observation and response systems HEMUS 2026 puts front and centre, a ready, capable, locally sourced thermal core shortens the road from concept to finished product. That is the conversation we came to have.
04 / Night Vision, Too
Thermal is only half of the irARM banner. We also build night vision: helmet-mounted, hands-free systems that amplify available light for close-quarters work, patrol and situational awareness, the kind of task where keeping both hands on the job matters. On the stand we showed headborne night vision optics ready to clip onto a standard helmet mount and flip down when they are needed.
Why Thermal Vision Belongs at HEMUS
Unlike night vision, which amplifies whatever light is available, thermal imaging detects the heat that every person, vehicle and engine radiates. That makes it effective in total darkness and straight through smoke, fog and light cover, with no ambient light required. Map that against the HEMUS 2026 agenda and the fit is obvious:
Border and perimeter security depends on spotting a warm figure crossing cold ground at 3 a.m. Counterterrorism and force protection rely on seeing first. Autonomous surveillance and ISR systems, including drone payloads, need a compact sensor that turns heat into a clear, streamable picture. Search and rescue teams use the same physics to find people who would otherwise be invisible. It is why we brought a thermal core built into an FPV drone airframe to the stand: a small, heat-seeing eye in the sky of exactly the kind that HEMUS 2026's focus on autonomous observation calls for. In every one of those missions the thermal sensor is the eye of the system, and irARM builds both the eye and the finished instrument around it.
Conversations on the Stand
HEMUS is, in the end, about people. Across the show we sat down with systems integrators, distributors and fellow members of the Bulgarian and international defence industry, alongside government and foreign official delegations passing through the halls. We put live thermal imagery in front of visitors, talked detector formats and integration, and started the kind of face-to-face exchanges that turn into long-term partnerships.
Standing on this floor, next to the established names of the sector, is itself a statement. It says irARM is a serious, capable, home-grown thermal imaging partner that is ready to supply both the finished optics and the cores that power someone else's. That visibility is exactly why an exhibition like HEMUS matters to a brand like ours.
Recognized for Precision
Recognition is not won at a single show; it is built one satisfied user at a time. The feedback we hear most often comes back to performance you can rely on: image quality and range that hold up in the field, hardware that survives real use, and a team that actually answers when you need it. That reputation is what brings people to our stand already knowing the name, and what we work to deserve with every unit we ship.
Come Find Us in Plovdiv
HEMUS 2026 runs 3 - 6 June at the International Fair Plovdiv. The first day is reserved for invited guests; the floor opens to experts, vendors and business visitors from 4 June onward. Stop by Hall 6, Booth 6-A-5 to look through a Hawk scope, see a ThruVision core run live, and talk OEM integration with our engineers. Cannot make it to Plovdiv? Explore the full range online or reach out any time.
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