Watch out, y’all. The Europeans are coming for your defense tech startups.
Leonardo DRS, the US subsidiary of Italian defense giant Leonardo, announced yesterday that it’s snapped up Virginia-based data fusion and AI defense software company Raft in an all-cash deal valued at $450M.
The deal, according to Leonardo DRS CEO John Baylouny, “adds proven software talent and open-architecture technology that complement our existing sensing and computing capabilities and strengthen our ability to deliver AI-enabled mission solutions at the speed our customers demand.”
Data dawgs: Founded in 2018, Raft—for those that have been spared the ubiquitous ads on DC metro buses—builds data fusion, AI, command-and-control, and app development software strictly for defense and national security.
- The company’s core data integration layer, called the Raft Data Platform, connects data from different sensors, software systems, hardware platforms, domains, and vendors into a single interface, with a focus on contested environments.
- They also have the Raft AI Mission System (AIMS), which runs on the RDP and allows users to build custom workflows for agentic battle management, geospatial intelligence analysis, mission report processing, and predictive mission analytics.
- The team raised $60M from Washington Harbor Partners in 2024, and has scored contracts with everyone from the Air Force to SOCOM (including a $349M IDIQ awarded in 2025), CYBERCOM, CENTCOM, and the Space Force—more than 25 agencies across the DoD, according to the company.
- You might also remember that they were a founding member of Lockheed’s NGC2 prototyping team.
On the same page: For Leonardo, the deal gives them a foothold in all those programs and in the US defense software world, but it also gives them an in-house data and AI layer that helps connect all the data from the physical sensors, computing tech, radars, EW systems, and other hardware the $13B company makes.
- It’s also the latest instance of a European prime snapping up a US startup. Late last year, Norwegian defense giant Kongsberg bought California-based low-cost cruise missile and drone company Zone 5 Technologies. That deal closed last month.
“Joining DRS is a natural next step for our team and our mission,” Raft Founder and CEO Shubhi Mishra said in a statement. “Our open-architecture platform was built to integrate across systems, not lock customers in, and pairing it with DRS’s sensing and computing franchises will accelerate our ability to deliver mission capability at a global scale.”
“The acquisition…enhances Leonardo DRS’s ability to deliver integrated, mission-focused technologies that help customers operate with greater speed, clarity and confidence in complex operational environments,” Leonardo (the parent company) CEO Lorenzo Mariani added. “Raft’s open-architecture software, AI and data integration capabilities are highly complementary and additive to Leonardo DRS’s existing technology portfolio.”
Leonardo said the Raft acquisition is expected to be accretive in the first full year of the transaction closing.
