With all eyes on an autonomous future of flight, it’s easy to forget the human pilots who will remain firmly in the cockpit for the foreseeable future. Luckily, one San Francisco-based company is remaining focused on people, even as we await the rise of the robots. Yesterday, Navi AI—a startup using AI to improve pilot […]
Looks like Epirus is making its relationship with GD Land Systems into a throuple. This morning, directed energy counter-UAS startup Epirus announced that it’s teaming up with General Dynamics Land Systems and ground autonomy hotshot Kodiak to build a mobile, autonomous drone-zapper called the Leonidas Autonomous Ground Vehicle (AGV). The AGV will be equipped with […]
Coming at you live from the picks-and-shovels side of defense tech. Today, VectorNav—which makes high-performance Inertial Navigation Systems (INSs) and Inertial Measurement Units (IMUs) for a whole range of zoomy and boomy things—rolled out a major upgrade to its accelerometer and gyroscope platform in an exclusive release to Tectonic. The upgrade is designed for super-high […]
For this morning’s exercise, we want you to take everything you’ve ever known about the way a drone looks or acts and throw it out the window. This morning, contested logistics startup Enigma emerged from stealth with a $5M Air Force contract and about $2M in VC funding in an exclusive release to Tectonic. The […]
It’s been a busy past few days for the weekend warriors over at Skydio. Yesterday, the US Army tapped California-based drone-maker Skydio to deliver 2,500 of its X10D small-UAS in a $52M contract, the largest sUAS order from a single vendor in Army history. The company said it moved from bid to award in under […]
Anduril is thinking big. Like really, really big—and nothing says that quite like Arsenal-1. Yesterday, Tectonic paid a visit to Anduril’s $1B, 5M square foot mega-factory just south of Columbus, Ohio, where the company (hard to call them a startup after a $20B Army contract) will kick off production of their Fury drone wingman in […]
If you thought the Crow Industries and Parry Labs mash-up was the only collab to come out of the Army’s xTech Overwatch competition, think again. This morning, GPS-free navigation company TERN and AI-powered simulation and planning company Sandtable announced in an exclusive release to Tectonic that they’re teaming up after the exercise to plug Sandtable’s […]
You know how the Arctic is, like, super remote, freezing, and increasingly contested? Well, all that makes comms a bit dodgy. Yesterday, defense communications and mission-systems company Ultra I&C announced that it’s sending its Archer troposcatter beyond-line-of-sight (BLOS) comms system up to the Arctic for operational trials with the Canadian Armed Forces. Tropo talk: If […]
Less than a year after dropping a cool $4.1B to acquire BlueHalo, AV—the artist formerly known as AeroVironment—is back with another acquisition. Earlier this week, the company snapped up California-based drone manufacturing and design firm ESAero for $200M. Under the deal, ESAero will function as a subsidiary of AV under its Loitering Munition Systems business […]
Well, Nominal is certainly having quite the past few weeks. This morning—on the heels of an $80M raise led by Founder’s Fund and an official partnership with Anduril—the Austin-based testing startup announced in an exclusive release to Tectonic that they’re officially teaming up with ground autonomy hotshot Forterra. Nominal CEO Cameron McCord told Tectonic that […]
