Industry & Contracts
Drone industry news from UASFeed — procurement awards, defense primes and startups, funding rounds, and the business of uncrewed systems.
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Industry & Contracts
Palladyne AI's GuideTech Wins $2.3M Deal to Arm a New Kinetic Counter-Drone Interceptor
GuideTech, a Palladyne AI subsidiary, secured a $2.3 million contract to supply its BRAIN flight computer and FLEX software to an undisclosed prime building a kinetic counter-UAS interceptor that has already completed flight testing.
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Industry & Contracts
Quantum Systems Raises $1.2 Billion in Europe's Largest-Ever Defense-Tech Financing
German drone maker Quantum Systems closed a $1.2 billion Series D at an $8 billion valuation on July 2, 2026, backed by Blackstone, Airbus and Advent, days after the U.S. Army tapped its Vector AI as a Company-Level sUAS candidate.
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Industry & Contracts
Heavy-Lift Cargo Drone Maker Elroy Air to Go Public in $1 Billion SPAC Deal
Elroy Air will list on Nasdaq as ELRY via a merger with Columbus Circle Capital Corp II, valuing the hybrid-electric Chaparral cargo drone maker at roughly $1 billion.
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Industry & Contracts
A Federal DJI Ban Just Cost One Oregon Police Department $18,000 a Drone — the Skydio Swap, Line by Line
Redmond, Oregon approved a $410,762, five-year financed Axon contract for six Skydio drones to replace its DJI fleet — a 3.5x price jump driven by the federal NDAA ban, not operational need.
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Industry & Contracts
Latvia and Ukraine Will Build Strike Drones Within Sight of the Russian Border
Latvia and Ukraine will build a joint drone factory in Latgale, deliberately sited near the Russia and Belarus borders, operationalizing a June 9 'Drone Deal' that trades Ukrainian strike, ground and maritime drones for Latvian anti-drone systems.
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Industry & Contracts
AeroVironment's Q4 Blowout: A $642M Quarter, a $1.2B Backlog, and the 'Drone Supercycle' Goes Mainstream
AeroVironment crushed estimates with a record $641.6M fiscal Q4, doubled annual revenue to nearly $2B, and grew funded backlog to $1.2B — sending shares up ~19% and turning 'drone supercycle' talk into public-market fact.
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Industry & Contracts
The Drone-Stock Supercycle: Pentagon Weighs Equity Stakes as DAWG Budget Balloons to $54.6B
U.S. drone stocks extended a sharp run in late June 2026 on reports the Pentagon is weighing equity stakes in domestic makers — the backdrop being a $54.6B FY27 request for the Defense Autonomous Warfare Group, up from a $225M base.
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Industry & Contracts
Unusual Machines Stands Up an Orlando Battery Plant Before Its Upgrade Energy Deal Even Closes
Unusual Machines signed a lease for ~14,000 sq ft of Orlando manufacturing space to scale domestic drone-battery output, moving ahead of the mid-Q3 close of its ~$52M Upgrade Energy acquisition.
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Industry & Contracts
Defense-Tech VC Blows Past Its Own Records: $14.6B in Five Months, and Drones Are Eating the Check
Venture funding into defense and national-security startups hit $14.6B in the first five months of 2026, already crushing 2025's full-year record of $9.6B, as drone and autonomy megarounds from Anduril, Shield AI and Saronic dominate the flow.
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Industry & Contracts
Stark Banks 500M Euros at 3.5B Valuation as Europe Bets Big on Loitering-Munition Mass Production
Berlin's Stark Defence raised ~500M euros (~$570M) at a ~3.5B euro valuation led by Sequoia and Founders Fund, with the NATO Innovation Fund participating, pouring 80%+ into factories to build "thousands of systems per month."
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Industry & Contracts
Ondas Books $40M in June C-UAS and Strike Drone Orders, Q2 Total Tops $150M
Ondas Inc. secured more than $40 million in new defense orders during June 2026 — spanning Counter-UAS platforms, loitering munition systems, and related services — while its UK subsidiary Rotron completed a key flight trial of the SkyLance one-way effector under the UK Ministry of Defence's Project Brakestop.
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Industry & Contracts
AeroVironment: How a Glider Champion Built America's Tactical Drone Empire
From Paul MacCready's human-powered aircraft to a $990 million Switchblade contract and a $4.1 billion BlueHalo merger, AeroVironment has quietly become the backbone of U.S. tactical UAS — and is now reshaping itself into a multi-domain defense-tech mid-prime.
