Counter-drone and air defence

• Laserdome test pairs AI tracking with laser effect
• US Army buys 13,000 Merops interceptors in eight days
• Vernius targets interceptions under $4,000
• Apex Recordhunter hits 777 km/h against jet Gerans
• New Ark acoustics detect drones in radar's blind band
• Germany sends Rheinmetall Skyranger to Ukraine
• Counter-drone market heads to $30 billion by 2034

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Ukraine war and battlefield adaptation

• Drone types branch into dozens of combat classes
• Starlink limits disrupt Ukrainian drone missions
• Ukraine launches over 1,000 drones on October 17 and 18
• Tank and Bradley return with cope cages and FPV escorts
• Helicopter gunner downs a Shahed-type drone
• Heavy drone evacuates a wounded soldier
• Geran-4 teardown shows reliance on foreign electronics

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Products, launches and demonstrations

• ideaForge launches ZOLT Hybrid and ZOLT UCAV
• Ghost Shark payloads revealed under AUKUS Pillar II
• F-22 Raptor teams with Anduril's FQ-44 Fury
• Quantum Systems demonstrates autonomous multi-domain convoys
• Ocius Bluebottle hunts submarines on wind, solar and waves
• Türkiye tests SİVRİSİNEK kamikaze drone swarms
• HENSOLDT MDOcore and ARTAK Block III make software the product
• Finland receives its first F-35s

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Capital and funding

• European defense tech takes 11.1% of venture funding
• Helsing's $1.8 billion Series E is the sector's largest round
• Anduril must stay a 10x company to hold a $90 billion valuation
• Warhound raises a $200 million seed for gene-edited war dogs
• Fortem raises $50 million to scale DroneHunter
• European Defence Fund draws a record 612 proposals
• Brave1 channels hundreds of millions into Ukrainian defense tech

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Procurement, policy and budgets

• Pentagon pulls 800 orders from non-delivering companies
• FY2027 autonomous warfare request totals $54.6 billion
• TITAN's $192 million award shows integration outranking weapons
• NATO's Theory of Victory treats capability as a full chain
• SOF RACER seeks edge sensor fusion with a $75 million ceiling
• EDA's €450 million satcom tender tests dependency
• EU adopts Council Decision 2026/2195 on space threats

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Industrial base and supply chains

• US builds under 100,000 small drones a year against 340,000 requested
• Components, not airframes, are the domestic bottleneck
• Single-use interceptors make counter-drone a volume business
• Lockheed Martin invests $300 million in Grand Prairie
• Fire Point builds 200 to 260 drones a day
• DICON and EIB Group localise UAV production in Nigeria
• EDA land systems R&T portfolio exceeds €300 million

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Thanks to Sriram Bala, Marijn Markus, Eva Sula, Perry Boyle, Mark K., Ben Fleschler, Sven Weizenegger, Mark Sedwill, Alex Trader, Bram Couwberghs, Timothy Lawn, Ben Moores, Kevin Benoit, Patrick Upmann, Antonio Salinas, Dean Bubley, Mingi Hyun, Benjamin Tallis, Adrian Munoz, Emeka A., Frank Rose, Thomas Falck, Richard Gwilliam, Andrius Kubilius, Kenneth Drabeck, Jim Taiclet, Oleksii Fokardi, Dima Rubanov, Hal Croasdale, Seán Moorhouse, Kishan Chand Nailwal, Doug Livermore, Matt Van Epps, Fernando Figueiredo, Elana Gold, Lawal David, Dr. Theresa A. Smith, Dave Sharpin, Michael McCormack, Dr. Galib Krdzalic, Jimmy Lee, Adam Scher, Josiah Wegner, Jimmy Zhao, Calogero Vinciguerra, Curt Belden, Richard Stroupe, AJ Green, Christian Brose, Tim Cahill, Shane Arnott, Artem Moroz, Mario Martinho, Sven Kruck, Kyle Briggs, Jan Barry Foster, Spyridon Georgiadis, Justin Nerdrum, Ken Thompson, Matthew Fulco, Isabelle Hudon, Julian Mömesheim, Geoffrey Williams, Mike Zugsmith, Jason F. Emert, Filippo Ion, Justin LeVrier, Richard Goodman, Florian Seibel and Darren Cochran for contributing insights to this edition. Find the full list of posts and voices on LinkedIn: