Latest news with #UASs
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3 days ago
- Politics
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Mass Drone Attack On Exposed Russian Bombers Puts Spotlight On Hardened Aircraft Shelter Debate
New details continue to emerge about Ukraine's unprecedented covert drone attacks on multiple Russian air bases, but the full scale and scope of the resulting losses remain unclear. It is the latest global event to put a spotlight on an already fierce debate about whether the U.S. military should be investing in more hardened aircraft shelters and other new fortified infrastructure at bases abroad and at home, something TWZ has been following closely. What we just saw in Russia is a nightmare scenario that we have already been sounding the alarm on for years now, which broadly underscores the growing threats posed by drones. Readers can first get up to speed on what is known about the attacks, which were focused on trying to neutralize Russian strategic bombers that are regularly used to conduct cruise missile attacks on Ukraine, in our latest reporting here. Authorities in Ukraine say they attacked five bases with a total of 117 small and relatively short-range first-person-view (FPV) type kamikaze drones, destroying or at least damaging 41 aircraft. Andriy Kovalenko, an official with Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council, has also said that 'at least 13 Russian aircraft were destroyed.' These claims have yet to be independently verified and they should be taken as speculative at this time. The russian terrorist state no longer has the ability to produce Tu-95s or any kind of strategic bomber. This is a tremendous victory for Ukraine. — Michael MacKay (@mhmck) June 1, 2025 The drones were launched from container-like enclosures built to look like small sheds or tiny homes on tractor-trailer trucks. Questions remain about exactly how they were guided to their targets, but at least some of them were human-in-the-loop guided by operators using first-person-view 'goggles' or tablet-like devices. 5/5. After launching, the trailers self-destructed to avoid detection or recovery (see photos). — Roman Sheremeta (@rshereme) June 2, 2025 From the imagery that has already emerged, a key aspect of the Ukrainian drone attacks was that the Russian planes that were targeted were parked out in the open. The fact that aircraft sitting on open flightlines are especially vulnerable, including to uncrewed aerial threats, is not new. 'One day last week, I had two small UASs that were interfering with operations… At one base, the gate guard watched one fly over the top of the gate check, tracked it while it flew over the flight line for a little while, and then flew back out and left,' now-retired Air Force Gen. James 'Mike' Holmes, then head of Air Combat Command (ACC), said in 2017, now nearly a decade ago. 'Imagine a world where somebody flies a couple hundred of those and flies one down the intake of my F-22s with just a small weapon on it.' At that time, TWZ noted that it would be easier for an adversary to just attack parked planes in the open, offering a way to knock out large numbers of aircraft before they can even get airborne. Since then, we have already had multiple opportunities to re-highlight the ever-growing risk of something like this occurring to America's armed forces, including scenarios involving more localized attacks on bases far from active war zones by lower-end weaponized commercial drones. The Russian military has been acutely aware of drone threats to air bases even before the all-out invasion of Ukraine in 2022. A mass drone attack on Russia's Khmeimim Air Base outpost in Syria in 2017 was a watershed moment that TWZ highlighted at the time as a sign of things to come. Regular drone attacks on Khmeimim in the late 2010s also prompted the construction of new hardened aircraft shelters there. Last year, Russia's Minister of Defense Andrey Belousov said that 'a schedule for airfields has already been drawn up and that shelters will definitely be built' in response to Ukrainian drone and missile attacks, according to independent Russian journalist Alexander Kots. The construction of new aircraft shelters, hardened and unhardened, had already been visible in satellite imagery of a growing number of air bases in Russia since late 2023. However, from what has been observed to date, the focus has been on better protecting tactical jets at bases closer to Ukraine. Just recently, Belousov was shown a model of a hangar with a Tu-160 Blackjack bomber inside as part of a presentation on new developments relating to prefabricated and modular structures for various military purposes. Whether or not the hangar model reflects an active project, or is a proposal or notional concept of some kind, is unclear. Tu-160s were among the aircraft types Ukraine explicitly targeted with its covert drone attacks this weekend. Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov was shown a model of a hangar for Tu-160 strategic bombers during a visit last — Rob Lee (@RALee85) June 2, 2025 Russia's construction of new aircraft shelters is part of an expanding global trend that has also been observed in China, North Korea, and elsewhere. Hardened Aircraft Shelters of J-10 Fighters — Húrin (@Hurin92) September 8, 2023 Geolocation: 39.4069444, 125.8983333Sunchon AB, DPRK (North Korea)10/27/23 Sentinel-2 L2A pass shows paving and shelters (16 total) completed. Sunchon is home to the KPAAF 57th Air Regiment (MiG-29s).@GeoConfirmedhttps:// — Evergreen Intel (@vcdgf555) December 1, 2023 Satellite imagery of Nasosnaya Air Base – Republic Of Azerbaijan Construction of hangars for JF-17 fighter jets, which began in early 2024, is now in its final stages. The base will soon be ready to host a full squadron of 16 aircraft. — آریان || Āryān (@BasedQizilbash) May 28, 2025 The U.S. military does have hardened aircraft shelters are various bases, but has made very limited investments in building more since the end of the Cold War. Calls for new shelters, hardened or otherwise, have been pointedly absent from U.S. military planning in recent years, at least publicly. Some American officials have actively pushed back on the idea, often citing the cost of building new hardened infrastructure, which is funding that could be applied elsewhere. The U.S. Air Force, for instance, has been more focused on active defenses, such as surface-to-air missile systems, and expanding the number of operating locations that forces could be dispersed to, if necessary. 'So, we will have the need for bases, the main operating bases from which we operate,' Air Force Gen. Kevin Schneider, head of Pacific Air Forces (PACAF), said at the Air & Space Forces Association's (AFA) 2025 Warfare Symposium in March. 'The challenge becomes, at some point, we will need to move to austere locations. We will need to disaggregate the force. We will need to operate out of other locations, again, one for survivability, and two, again, to provide response options.' Those are requirements that 'cost money' and force the Air Force to 'make internal trades,' such as 'do we put that dollar towards, you know, fixing the infrastructure at Kadena [Air Base in Japan] or do we put that dollar towards restoring an airfield at Tinian,' Schneider added. There is growing criticism that U.S. forces are being left increasingly vulnerable, including to drone attacks, by a lack of investment in hardened aircraft shelters and other new fortified facilities. A recent deployment of six of the U.S. Air Force's 19 prized B-2 stealth bombers to the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, which wrapped up earlier this month, had offered a new datapoint in the shelter debate. Diego Garcia only has four specially designed B-2 shelters open, which are not hardened in any way, and the bombers were seen parked out in the open while on the island. More recently, a detachment of F-15E Strike Eagles arrived on the island to help provide force protection to other assets still there. 'While 'active defenses' such as air and missile defense systems are an important part of base and force protection, their high cost and limited numbers mean the U.S. will not be able to deploy enough of them to fully protect our bases,' a group of 13 Republican members of Congress had written in an open letter to the heads of the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy in May 2024. 'In order to complement active defenses and strengthen our bases, we must invest in 'passive defenses,' like hardened aircraft shelters and underground bunkers, dispersal of forces across both within a base and across multiple bases, redundant logistical facilities, and rapid runway repair capabilities.' 'While hardened aircraft shelters do not provide complete protection from missile attacks, they do offer significantly more protection against submunitions than expedient shelters (relocatable steel shelters). They would also force China to use more force to destroy each aircraft, thereby increasing the resources required to attack our forces and, in turn, the survivability of our valuable air assets,' they added. 'Constructing hardened shelters for all our air assets may not be economically feasible or tactically sensible, but the fact that the number of such shelters on U.S. bases in the region has barely changed over a decade is deeply troubling.' In January, the Hudson Institute think tank in Washington, D.C., released a report that underscores the points made above about the benefits that new hardened aircraft shelters offer in terms of reducing vulnerability and increasing the resources an enemy would have to expend. The authors of the Hudson report assessed that 10 missiles, each with a warhead capable of scattering cluster munitions across areas 450 feet in diameter, could be enough to neutralize all aircraft parked in the open and critical fuel storage facilities at key airbases like Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni in Japan, Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, or Langley Air Force Base in Virginia. The general points made here about the particular danger of submunitions from cluster weapons could also apply to drones with similarly sized warheads like the ones Ukraine just used in its attacks on Russia's air bases. Even fully-enclosed, but unhardened shelters could provide a modicum of additional defense against these kinds of threats. Last year, officials at two U.S. air bases – Langley Air Force Base in Virginia and Seymour Johnson Air Force Base in North Carolina – expressed interest in the possibility of adding nets or other similar physical defensive measures to existing open-ended sunshade-type shelters to help protect against attacks by smaller drones. It's unclear whether there has been any movement since on actual implementation. Nets are among the drone defenses currently used on both sides of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Waves of still-mysterious drone incursions over Langley Air Force Base in December 2023, which TWZ was the first to report on, remain a particular focal point for broader calls from Congress and elsewhere to better protect U.S. military facilities against uncrewed aerial threats. What happened at Langley is just one of a still-growing number of worrisome drone incidents over and around U.S. military facilities, training ranges, and warships off the coast of the United States, as well as critical civilian infrastructure, in the past decade or so, many of which we have reported first. Overseas bases well outside of established conflict zones that host American forces have been the site of concerning drone overflights in recent years, as well. There was also a flurry of reported drone sightings last year over New Jersey and other parts of the United States last year, many of which quickly turned out to be spurious. However, the surge in public attention underscored a real threat, as Ukraine has now demonstrated in dramatic fashion. While Ukraine says its covert drone attacks on Russia took more than a year to plan, prepare for, and stage, they also underscore how the basic barriers to entry for carrying out drone attacks, especially ones involving weaponized commercial designs, have long been low in terms of cost and technical aptitude. The operation notably leveraged ArduPilot, described as an 'open source autopilot system' that is freely available online. Of course open source software has been used in war before, but seeing ArduPilot Mission Planner being used to blow up Russian strategic bombers is still wild. — John Wiseman (@ 2025-06-01T15:55:48.877Z Additional footage shows another FPV drone overflying the airfield; multiple Tupolev Tu-95 bombers are seen aflame. — Jimmy Rushton (@JimmySecUK) June 1, 2025 18 years after @Jrdmnz @jason4short and I created ArduPilot, here it is destroying large parts of the Russian air force. Crazy — Chris Anderson (@chr1sa) June 1, 2025 Drone threats are only to expand and accelerate in terms of sophistication, thanks in large part to advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning, as time goes on. Uncrewed aerial systems with rapidly improving autonomous navigation and targeting capabilities that do not require a human in the loop present particularly serious threats. Without the need for an active link to a human operator, those drones are immune to jamming and do not pump out radio emissions that can help provide early warning to defenders. They are also not limited in range to keep a connection with their controllers. Improving capabilities to autonomously find and prosecute targets are already emerging on one-way-attack drones, and this is something that can be expected to proliferate, as well. Autonomous drones that can target objects dynamic targeting without having to rely just on a fixed set of coordinates via satellite navigation like GPS, another signal that can be disrupted, will only make drone threats more complex and vastly harder to counter overall. TWZ has explored all of this in great detail in this past feature. Swarming is another area that will make lower-end drones so much harder to defeat. Working cooperatively as an integrated team at computer speeds allows drones to operate and react with extreme efficiency beyond the pace of the enemy's decision cycle. This, along with sheer mass and the resilience that goes with that, can quickly overwhelm defenses. 'In general, the technology to field systems has far outpaced the technology to defeat those systems,' Rear Adm. Paul Spedero, Vice Director for Operations, J3, Joint Chiefs of Staff, told members of the House Oversight Committee at a hearing on drone threats in April. 'It's a much wider, broader, deeper market for drone application, for commercial and recreational purposes, so hence that technology has evolved very quickly from radio control drones to now fully autonomous drones that may or may not even rely on reception of a GPS signal, which would make it very challenging to intercept.' Ukraine's covert drone attacks on Russia also underscore that these are increasingly threats unbounded by basic geography. An adversary could launch uncrewed aerial attackers from 1,000 miles away or from an area right next to the target, or anywhere in between. There are many drone types that can address those missions needs, and affordably so. Those drones could be launched from the ground, from ships at sea, and/or from aerial platforms, including other lower-end drones. Complex attacks involving different tiers of threats approaching from multiple vectors at once only add to the complications for defending forces. Ukrainian "Dovbush" UAV carrying and releasing two FPV drones during "Dovbush" UAV is reportedly capable of carrying up to six FPV drones at the same — Status-6 (Military & Conflict News) (BlueSky too) (@Archer83Able) November 19, 2024 Despite all this, America's armed forces have also continued to lag in the fielding of counter-drone defenses for forces down-range, as well as bases and other assets in and around the homeland. Domestically, an often convoluted array of legal, regulatory, and other factors have presented challenges. On the sidelines of a U.S. military counter-drone experiment called Falcon Peak 2025 in October 2024, TWZ and other outlets were notably told that lasers, microwaves, surface-to-air missiles, and guns were all off the table as options for neutralizing drones within the United States, at least at the time. For over a decade I have outlined the exact scenario as we just saw in Russia. It could happen in the U.S. tomorrow. This was a pivotal event. U.S. military and political leadership cannot live in partial denial of this threat anymore. Our most prized aircraft are sitting ducks. — Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) June 1, 2025 The biggest challenge with this issue is education. Many just don't take the time to learn the ins and outs of the UAS threat, there are many layers and nuances, emerging technologies. There are high up people in the military that don't even really understand these basics. Then… — Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) June 1, 2025 The U.S. military does continue to push for enhancements to the authorities it has now to protect its bases and other assets domestically against drone threats. As part of a new Pentagon-wide counter-drone strategy rolled out last year, U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM) has a 'synchronizer role' that includes making sure commanders know what they are allowed to do now if drones appear around their facilities. Ukraine's drone attacks on Russian air bases this past weekend can only add to the already intense debate over investments in hardened aircraft shelters and other fortified infrastructure, as well as fuel calls for new counter-drone defenses, in general. The stark reality of what Ukrainian intelligence services have now demonstrated makes clear that uncrewed aerial threats, including to key assets deep inside a country's national territory, are well past the point of something that can be ignored. Contact the author: joe@
Yahoo
23-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
How sensory cues can help ‘burdened' drone operators
Have you ever turned down the radio while you were driving to see better? While seeing and hearing are two very different senses, in that kind of situation, your brain is working to process the audio and visual stimuli at the same time.. 'It's cognitive processing that's happening. Even if it's in the background of your awareness, that makes it a little bit more challenging to do what the task at hand is,' said Heath Jones, a research neuroscientist for the Army Aeromedical Research Laboratory. 'That overloads you to some degree and it depends on what those signals are. Now, if it's just the radio playing, that's fine, but if it's something where it's someone telling you the instructions on how to get there, you may not be able to turn that down.' Too much external stimuli can cause cognitive overload — something that pilots can experience in more dangerous circumstances than just missing an exit on the highway. The same is true, the Army is finding, with operators of drones. But a technique called multi-sensory cueing, which incorporates auditory and haptic or 'touch' alerts, Jones said, can help alleviate some of that overload. 'The idea is we can start to offload some of that information that we're putting on the visual system onto these other systems,' Jones said. 'It should not increase the cognitive burden as much as having them try to look at everything while flying the aircraft and make sure they know what's outside of the aircraft as well.' As the Army incorporates more unmanned aerial systems, or UASs, into its formations, researchers like Jones are looking at how audio and sensory cues can help drone operators. In the same way that regular pilots have to monitor dozens of radios and screens in the cockpit, drone operators have a similar job of tracking a lot of visual information all at once. 'A lot of the technologies that we use in the cockpit, we can use in the control stations for UAS,' Jones said. 'If you think of the human in the cockpit or in the UAS control station or in the air traffic control environment, they deal with a lot of the similar issues.' The idea of multi-sensory cueing as a way to tackle operator 'overload' was acknowledged back in 2015 in an Air Force's chief scientist report which said that drone operations would require multi-tasking and cause 'limited visual attention.' The chief also wrote that multi-sensory cues could 'compensate for loss of haptic and auditory information.' One method that Army researchers are looking at to reduce cognitive burden is something that the Air Force Research Laboratory even had a hand in developing more than a decade ago. What the Air Force described as '3-D audio' or a 'sound environment that mimics the way the human body receives aural cues' is what Jones calls 'spatializing audio' or separating different sound streams, like multiple radio channels in the cockpit. The audio can come from a 'virtual space where it sounds like it's coming outside of the head from a location in front of you,' Jones said. For a pilot or operator talking to other aircraft in their formation, 'you could tune that radio on your left and put it in a virtual space location to your left,' he added. Another technique that researchers are exploring is haptic cueing through sensations like vibrations in a shoulder pad or under the seat which could give pilots 'information about your aircraft relative to where it's supposed to be,' Jones said. This summer, researchers will demo multi-sensory cueing at a UAS summit at Fort Novosel, Alabama, said Bethany Ranes, a sensory scientist for the human performance group at the Army's aeromedical lab. 'Multi-sensory queuing has been used with our helicopter pilots,' Ranes said. 'The reason we're doing the demo in August is because it's a ready-to-deploy technology that they can pop right in and start to use with the UAS operators in a variety of different kinds of training environments.' At Fort Novosel, the full-motion Blackhawk simulator has a multisensory cueing system and others like the Longbow trainer for Apache helicopter crews, the transportable simulator for Blackhawks, and the Blackhawk aircrew simulator have 'features of motion cuing' built into aircrew seats, according to the simulation directorate. According to aeromedical lab officials, their simulator for Grey Eagle and Shadow drones 'can easily be fitted' with multisensory cueing technology but efforts to install it are on hold until there is a more formal plan for UAS crew stations. 'It will be easier to write requirements and implement these technologies into modernization efforts than for re-fitting the 'enduring' or 'legacy' fleets,' aeromedical lab officials said. The concept of multi-sensory cueing has been looked at for traditional pilots who are typically monitoring dozens of buttons, screens and several radios playing on their headsets. With an overwhelming amount of information to track, pilots can get overwhelmed by multiple stimuli and miss things that are sometimes right in front of them, a psychological phenomenon called inattentional blindness. A New Zealand university study noted in 2022 that while there's been a lot of research and focus on inattentional blindness for car drivers distracted by cellphone conversations, 'almost no comparable research has been conducted within the aviation domain despite the significance of both ground-based and mid-air collisions.' But with multi-sensory cueing, Jones said that the alerts are more attuned to natural human instincts and could notify operators that they need to respond by making a decision or course correcting. Feeling a 'buzz buzz buzz' on your right shoulder or hearing a 'beep beep beep' in your right ear would tell the pilot that there's something on their right side that needs attention. 'If you think about the auditory system and its development, you needed to know whether the tiger was behind you on the right or left so you know which way to go,' Jones said. 'You don't really need to think about these cues as much. You just need to know what they mean and what to do after you feel them.' One device developed by Army aeromedical laboratory researcher Angus Rupert, the Tactile Situation Awareness System, or TSAS, uses a vibration vest to alert pilots of the aircraft orientation irregularities. For example, if a plane is tilting slightly left, the vest buzzes on their left side to prompt the pilot to correct it. 'If the phone is in your left pocket and it buzzes, you know it's on the left side. Now, if you imagine taking eight phones and putting it on a belt around you. You could then buzz someone in the front, back, side or the cardinal directions to give them some information,' Jones said. Despite existing research and development of audio and haptic cueing technology by the military itself, it's not as prolific across the force — a common problem that the military deals with when it comes to developing and buying emerging technology. 'I think the thing that's going to move it faster are unfortunate accidents that occur that could have been prevented with technology such as this. The most recent is the accident above the Potomac,' Jones said. 'A lot of these technologies can provide information to the pilot that does not take their eyes off of their instruments [and] does not put another display in front of them for them to look at or monitor.' The Army Combat Readiness Center conducted a survey with five trained investigators to look at the use of TSAS for preventing accidents, according to a summer 2015 article in Flightfax. Between 1992 and 2011, there were 330 Class A rotary-wing mishaps that resulted in fatalities or permanent disability and which did at least $2.5 million in damage. Investigators determined that almost a quarter of the accidents (63 fatalities and more than $700 million in costs), could have been prevented with the TSAS vest. An Army investigation of an August 2017 crash that killed five soldiers during nighttime training off Hawaii found that the pilots had experienced 'spatial disorientation,' meaning they couldn't determine their position and altitude relative to the earth's surface. Pilots experienced the same spatial disorientation issues during a 2015 Black Hawk helicopter crash during night training flight off the coast of Florida which killed four Louisiana National Guardsmen and seven special operations Marines. 'There's nothing you can see outside. It's just pitch black. There's nothing that can give you any information,' Jones said. 'The forces they're feeling from their position relative to the gravitational forces and how the forces of the movement of the aircraft work, they didn't even realize that they were in as bad a shape as they were.' In April 2024, after 12 crashes and 10 deaths over a six-month-span, the Army ordered additional safety training across aviation units to 'reinforce' pilot skills, including spatial awareness. Historically, drone operator jobs have been very passive or as Ranes put it bluntly: boring. 'A lot of the time they're just sitting there. The fancy schmancy way that we refer to that in our work is there's a mismatch in cognitive load — where we have non-optimized transitions from low workload to high workload, which just means you're bored out of your gourd for a really long time, but then suddenly you have to act very quickly and decisively.' By watching the evolution of drones on the battlefield in Ukraine, the Army has realized that 'a passive role for a UAS operator is a completely under-utilization of what we can be doing with unmanned technology,' according to Ranes. While trying to make the jobs less monotonous with different types of cueing to keep pilots alert to changes around them, researchers are still figuring out what types of information need to be cued. 'We're trying to understand the cognitive offloading in terms of what would be more beneficial to offload, what would be detrimental to take away from the pilot,' Jones said. 'Those types of questions still need to be answered to some degree.' Jones said he could envision a reality where drone operations are less visual and more interactive. 'I can imagine someone just flying and they're able to do a little bit more than what they're able to do now because a lot of this information is being provided to them. That allows them to keep their eyes out of the displays whenever they are able to see outside the aircraft, and when they aren't able to see outside the aircraft, they don't get so focused on the one thing that's going to keep the aircraft level that they miss everything else.' Top enlisted leader of Air Force Special Operations Command fired amid investigation The Marine in one of the most famous recruiting commercials is now in Congress 75th Ranger Regiment wins 2025 Best Ranger Competition Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer reenlists in Marine Reserve Air Force pilots get a new way to pee at 30,000 feet
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
IPO Candidate Anduril Industries Makes Military Drones -- and Shoots Them Down, Too
Privately held Anduril Industries was named after the Sword of Kings in J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy. Established for the purpose of building fantastical, artificial intelligence-powered weapons for the U.S. military, it has at least a couple of things in common with another defense contractor with a name borrowed from Tolkien: Palantir. The biggest difference between the two companies: Palantir is publicly traded, and Anduril isn't -- so you can't yet invest in Anduril. However, Anduril has made no secret of its intention to conduct an initial public offering (IPO) sometime soon. For that reason, over the past few weeks, I've been conducting a moderately deep dive into Anduril -- who founded it, what it does, and when it might go public. Last month, for example, I surveyed every major Pentagon contract Anduril entered into in 2024, and came away with the distinct impression: Anduril is primarily a drone company. It may not be the world's biggest manufacturer of military drones. But the seven big contracts Anduril won last year are worth about $400 million in future revenue -- nearly as much as all the revenue it collected in 2023. But do you know what might make even more money for Anduril than building drones? Shooting them down. The Pentagon prefers to call drones either "unmanned aerial vehicles" (UAVs) or "unmanned aerial systems" (UASs). Similarly, when describing systems designed to counter threats from hostile drones -- to detect, track, and destroy them -- the military generally calls such systems C-UAVs or C-UASs. The public got its latest hint of how big a business counter-unmanned aerial vehicles systems might be for Anduril earlier this month when the Pentagon's daily digest of contract awards highlighted a $642.2 million contract granted to the company. Under this contract, Anduril will "deliver, install, and sustain Installation-Counter small Unmanned Aircraft Systems" at fixed locations (specifically, Marine Corps bases). In Pentagon-speak, the program will be known by the acronym "I-CsUAS". A 2022 article published on the official website of the U.S. Marine Corps noted that I-CsUAS will involve the construction of long-range sentry towers equipped with radar, optical sensors, and passive radio frequency detection capability, and utilizing Anduril's "Lattice" artificial intelligence (AI) software to identify, categorize, track, and destroy incoming UAV threats. reported that, in total, Anduril defeated nine other companies to win the I-CsUAS contract. Among those rivals was Israel's Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, maker of the Israeli Iron Dome missile defense system. Anduril's bid was probably helped by the fact that, in addition to being a U.S. company, it (like Rafael) was able to offer the Marines an existing, combat-proven system that "can deliver real capability ... today" because it's already "been in service for many years ... with multiple services at multiple locations around the world" -- including U.S. Special Operations Command. Now, Anduril just needs to execute on its contract. reported last year that initial operational capability for I-CsUAS might arrive during the government's fiscal 2025 third quarter (which ends Sept. 30). Last week, CBS News 60 Minutes quoted NORAD commander Gen. Gregory Guillot discussing plans to install drone defense systems similar to I-CsUAS "inside of a year." That could still happen, but Anduril itself did not state a date for first installation or initial operational capability in its announcement. Given that the contract was only just awarded, a 2026 timeline seems more likely. When ever it starts, the Pentagon's contract announcement noted that Anduril will be working on this project through March 2035. This is an important detail for investors to keep in mind. On the one hand, $642.2 million is a lot of money -- more than all the revenue Anduril collected in 2023 across its entire business, and awarded here in just one single contract. However, this contract will stretch over 10 years, meaning its value per year is closer to $64 million. That's still a lot of money for this company, about 14% of 2023 revenue, and about 6.4% of the $1 billion revenue that Anduril founder Palmer Luckey previously said the company probably did in 2024. Put another way, winning this single contract will add 6.4% to the company's growth rate in 2025 and beyond. Moreover, should Anduril's systems perform well, that would likely lead to it landing more and bigger contracts -- perhaps many more and much bigger. Consider that, at last report, the U.S. Marine Corps had a total of 21 operational military bases in the U.S. and abroad that might need drone protection. The entire U.S. military, however, has closer to 750 military bases scattered around the globe. In that context, I'd suspect there's a lot of room for this I-CsUAS contract to grow in future years, and with it, the entire company. That's why I can hardly wait to see Anduril IPO. Ever feel like you missed the boat in buying the most successful stocks? Then you'll want to hear this. On rare occasions, our expert team of analysts issues a 'Double Down' stock recommendation for companies that they think are about to pop. If you're worried you've already missed your chance to invest, now is the best time to buy before it's too late. And the numbers speak for themselves: Nvidia: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2009, you'd have $312,980!* Apple: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2008, you'd have $42,421!* Netflix: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2004, you'd have $537,825!* Right now, we're issuing 'Double Down' alerts for three incredible companies, and there may not be another chance like this anytime soon.*Stock Advisor returns as of March 24, 2025 Rich Smith has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Palantir Technologies. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. IPO Candidate Anduril Industries Makes Military Drones -- and Shoots Them Down, Too was originally published by The Motley Fool Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
25-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
U.S. Department of Defense's Defense Innovation Unit Adds Mobilicom's SkyHopper PRO Micro to Blue UAS Framework
Marks the 3rd Mobilicom datalink to be added to the approved short list of products in the Blue UAS program designed to secure commercial UAS technology for the Department of Defense Palo Alto, California, Feb. 25, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Mobilicom Limited (Nasdaq: MOB), a provider of cybersecurity and robust solutions for drones and robotics, today announced that the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD)'s Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) has expanded the number of Mobilicom datalinks approved and included in the Blue UAS Framework, with the addition of SkyHopper PRO move follows the DIU's recent approval of the Company's SkyHopper PRO and SkyHopper PRO Lite datalinks for the Blue UAS Framework. This most recent expansion of Mobilicom's list of products in the Blue UAS Framework is expected to further drive Mobilicom's growing prominence as a trusted provider of end-to-end solutions for top-tier OEMs of uncrewed aerial systems (UASs) that sell to the DoD, America's military allies, and global commercial customers for industrial applications. 'We are very proud of how rapidly our growing slate of field-proven UAS solutions are being recognized, evaluated, and approved by the DIU for the Blue UAS Framework,' stated Mobilicom CEO and Founder Oren Elkayam. 'We believe this is a direct result of the performance, value, and security offered by our systems, which today are critical components in UASs manufactured by Tier-1 OEMs and used in the most challenging environments globally.' Mobilicom's NDAA-compliant end-to-end hardware and software solutions are currently integrated into drones and robotics deployed in defense and commercial applications worldwide, including in UASs procured by the U.S. DoD. Federal contractors are required to abide by NDAA requirements, which prohibit the use of equipment made in China. The SkyHopper PRO Micro is an ultra-compact cognitive software defined radio (SDR) designed for high-volume production of loitering munitions, mini drones, and robotics. With a small C-SWaP (cost, size, weight, and power), it offers reliable communication for mission-critical applications, ensuring seamless integration into lightweight and high-performance platforms. All three Blue UAS-certified SkyHopper models feature Mobilicom's ICE cybersecurity protection, which secures mission-critical communications against electronic warfare threats. The combination of SkyHopper SDRs and ICE delivers unparalleled operational resilience, providing robust, secure performance in contested environments. About Blue UAS The Blue UAS Framework was established by the DIU to rapidly vet and scale commercial UAS technology for the DoD. The program tests, selects, and maintains a roster of NDAA compliant, policy approved UAS components and software that meet the standards of the DoD and its Programs of Record, as well as serving the needs of industry, federal, state, and local governments. The framework provides a short list of approved venders with advanced capabilities to Blue UAS developers, thereby reducing risk for government customers. Criteria for consideration for the Blue UAS program include endorsement of the vendor by a DoD sponsor, offering a new capability not previously available, and no overlap with other platforms already on the Blue UAS list. About Mobilicom Mobilicom is a leading provider of cybersecure robust solutions for the rapidly growing defense and commercial drones and robotics market. Mobilicom's large portfolio of field-proven technologies includes cybersecurity, software, hardware, and professional services that power, connect, guide, and secure drones and robotics. Through deployments across the globe with over 50 customers, including the world's largest drone manufacturers, Mobilicom's end-to-end solutions are used in mission-critical functions. For investors, please use company, please use Forward Looking Statements This press release contains 'forward-looking statements' that are subject to substantial risks and uncertainties. For example, the Company is using forward-looking statements when it discusses its growing prominence as a trusted provider of end-to-end solutions for top-tier OEMs of uncrewed aerial systems (UASs) that sell to the DoD, America's military allies, and global commercial customers for industrial applications. All statements, other than statements of historical fact, contained in this press release are forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements contained in this press release may be identified by the use of words such as 'anticipate,' 'believe,' 'contemplate,' 'could,' 'estimate,' 'expect,' 'intend,' 'seek,' 'may,' 'might,' 'plan,' 'potential,' 'predict,' 'project,' 'target,' 'aim,' 'should,' 'will' 'would,' or the negative of these words or other similar expressions, although not all forward-looking statements contain these words. Forward-looking statements are based on Mobilicom Limited's current expectations and are subject to inherent uncertainties, risks and assumptions that are difficult to predict. Further, certain forward-looking statements are based on assumptions as to future events that may not prove to be accurate. These and other risks and uncertainties are described more fully in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Forward-looking statements contained in this announcement are made as of this date, and Mobilicom Limited undertakes no duty to update such information except as required under applicable law. For more information on Mobilicom, please contact: Liad GelferMobilicom in to access your portfolio
