Drone company DZYNE has officially delivered “multiple” of their Grasshopper expendable cargo drones to the US Air Force, as part of their collaboration with the Air Force Research Laboratory, the company told Tectonic in an exclusive release.
“This milestone underscores … the critical role Grasshopper will play not only in contested logistics but also in humanitarian aid and disaster relief operations,” DZYNE CEO Matthew McCue said.
DZYNE was awarded a $49M AFRL contract in 2023 to deliver UAS systems to the Air Force. Alongside Grasshopper, DZYNE also produces long-range ISR drones, counter-UAS systems, and drone software.
Precious cargo: Grasshopper is about 12 feet long and looks a bit like a fridge with wings.
- It can carry up to 500 lbs and travel over 100 miles per hour.
- It’s designed for resupply and cargo delivery missions, especially when they’d be high-risk to manned aircraft.
- It’s expendable, and designed for “nose-landing on target,” which means — in other words — it safely crash lands to deliver cargo.
- It’s designed to fly in “high-risk” situations and performs well in jammed and GPS-denied environments, according to the company.
- It was also designed for the Air Force as a “low-cost” logistics solution, DZYNE said, but they declined to give a per-unit cost.
Speed up: Grasshopper went from a research concept to fielded capability in just 12 months, according to DZYNE, and this is just the beginning. They say that they plan to create a longer-range variant of the drone that will be available in 2026.
The company is already ramping up production of Grasshopper in its 125,000-square-foot facility in Irvine, California, which opened in 2023.