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Within the European Integrated Project NACRE (New Aircraft Concept REsearch) led by Airbus, a team of research centers and universities developed a multidisciplinary flying testbed called IEP (Innovative Evaluation Platform). Under the form of a dynamically scaled model of a future civil transport aircraft, its role is to assist engineers during the assessment of flight dynamics characteristics and noise reduction capabilities. After the feasibility study during which potential scientific and economical benefits of such new test facility have been identified, the team decided to design and manufacture the IEP. Because of the dual aspect of the system (it is a flying unmanned aerial vehicle and a test facility), an extensive requirement analysis has been carried out by the partners in order to identify the necessary operational modes and their associated navigation and control strategies.