It’s been (another) busy, busy week in defense tech, especially for everyone’s favorite globetrotting neo-prime.
Over the past few days, Anduril has announced a new autonomous air vehicle (AAV) called Omen, its selection for the Army’s Integrated Battle Command System Maneuver (IBCS-M) program, a partnership with Hyundai Heavy Industries on autonomous surface vessels (ASVs), and a new testbed ecosystem in the UK.
Does Palmer Luckey ever sleep?
Omenous: Anduril’s big splash this week was its new “tail-sitter” vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) drone, Omen, produced in partnership with United Arab Emirates-based defense mega-conglomerate EDGE Group.
- Omen, which has been in production since 2019, has already undergone flight testing, and Anduril says they’ve “logged hundreds of flight hours across 30+ prototypes” of the Omen platform.
- Anduril hasn’t released all of Omen’s specs, but the company says it’s in the Group 3 category, has a payload capacity “three to five times” that of most drones in that class, and can fly three to four times as far as most other Group 3 drones on the market.
- Omen is built to shift between typical VTOL operations and more airplane-style flight for longer missions.
The UAE will get its hands on the first 50 Omens, but Anduril’s planning to pump out more at their future Arsenal-1 factory in Ohio. They added that Omen is just the first in a series of autonomous systems they’ll produce with EDGE, with whom they’ve formed a production, sales, and sustainment joint venture called the EDGE–Anduril Production Alliance.
Sounds like Luckey’s getting lucky with the Emiratis. (Tell us we’re funny.)
Seaworthy: If Omen wasn’t enough, Anduril also announced it’s diving into the every-busy unmanned surface vessel game with South Korean shipbuilder Hyundai Heavy Industries.
- The first ASV prototype is under production in South Korea at a Hyundai Heavy facility, but Anduril says future vessels—including their bid for the Navy’s Modular Attack Surface Craft (MASC) program—will be built in the US at a shipyard in Seattle.
- The prototype vessel’s “open-architecture design supports interchangeable payloads, allowing the same vessel to perform intelligence, surveillance, strike, electronic warfare, and other missions through rapid reconfiguration,” Anduril said in a statement.
Networking: And if Omen and autonomous warships weren’t enough, Anduril was tapped for the US Army’s Integrated Battle Command System Maneuver (IBCS-M) program on Monday. The IBC-M program, basically, is designed as the C2 and integration backbone for the Army’s counter-drone systems, so Anduril finessing its Lattice software into that is a pretty big deal.
“We can’t think of counter-UAS as static or in the same vein as counter ballistic missile defense,” Army CTO Alex Miller said in a statement. “It has to be maneuverable which means it has to be software-centric and adaptable above all else.”
Big buzz: Finally, the company announced a new testbed ecosystem in the UK, where they test a “suite of artificial intelligence-powered products for our military use, pushing reconnaissance, command-and-control, and targeting capabilities to their limits.” The company says that “several of these sovereign capabilities are actively flying in the Welsh countryside.” Sounds idyllic.
Anduril UK added they’ve spent more than 40 percent of their internal revenue and capital on R&D, so that testbed could pump out some new tech to get the Brits buzzing.
And if all that wasn’t enough for one week, you need to get your head checked, because Anduril is on a freaking roll. Anyone got the inside scoop on IPO plans?