Big week for the nuts and bolts side of defense. Yesterday, Sift—an El Segundo-based startup building the data infrastructure layer for autonomous machines—announced that it’s raised a $42M Series B led by StepStone with participation from GV (Google Ventures), Riot Ventures, Fika Ventures, and CIV. The company says it’ll use the new cash money to […]
Lasers…so hot right now. Yesterday, AeroVironment (AV) unveiled the latest and greatest version of its LOCUST counter-drone laser, the X3. The platform, which AV says offers “engagements below $5 per shot,” is designed to take down small- to medium-sized drones. Lightshow: In case you haven’t been keeping your eye on the war in Iran, figuring […]
If anyone thought the collective spending spree on defense tech was coming to an end any time soon, think again. Yesterday, Texas-based VC Overmatch Ventures announced that it’s raised a cool $250M second fund, less than 2 years after raising a debut $70M fund in 2024. Jordan Blashek—GP at Overmatch—told Tectonic that this new pile […]
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 […]
Someone queue up Sweet Home Alabama. On Friday, new-age manufacturing company Hadrian announced a big-time, $2.4B partnership with the US Navy—split between $1.5B in private capital and $900M in government funding—to produce components for the Virginia and Columbia-class submarine programs at the startup’s new 2.2M square-foot facility in Cherokee, Alabama. Looks like Hadrian’s $611M in […]
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 […]
