When Palmer Luckey cofounded the defense startup Anduril in 2017, three years after selling his virtual reality startup Oculus to Facebook, the idea of a twentysomething from the tech industry challenging the giant contractors that build fighter jets, tanks, and warships for the US military seemed somewhat far-fetched. Seven years on, Luckey is showing that Anduril can not only compete with those contractors--it can win. Last month, Anduril was one of two companies, along with the established defense contractor General Atomics, chosen to prototype a new kind of autonomous fighter jet called the Collaborative Combat Aircraft, or CCA, for the US Air Force and Navy. Anduril was chosen ahead of a pack of what Beltway lingo dubs "defense primes"--Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrup Grummond. "Anduril is proving that with the right team and business model, a seven-year-old company can go toe-to-toe with players that have been around for 70," Luckey wrote on social media platform X shortly after the contract was announced.

The Pentagon will look to develop new artificial intelligence-guided planes, offering two contracts that several private companies have been competing to obtain. The Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) project is part of a 6 billion program that will add at least 1,000 new drones to the U.S. Air Force. These drones would deploy alongside human-piloted jets and provide cover for them, acting as escorts with full weapons capabilities that could also act as scouts or communications hubs, The Wall Street Journal reported. Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, General Atomics and Anduril Industries have all taken up the challenge. General Atomics supplied the Reaper and Predator drones the U.S. has deployed in numerous campaigns in the Middle East, and Anduril is a newcomer to the field, founded in 2017 by inventor Palmer Luckey, an entrepreneur who founded Oculus VR.

The US Army is developing its most powerful laser yet that is a million times more powerful than current systems. Most laser weapons fire a continuous beam until a target melts or catches fire, but the Tactical Ultrashort Pulsed Laser (UPSL) for Army Platforms will emit short, pulse-like bursts. Its being designed to reach a terawatt for a brief 200 femtoseconds, which is one quadrillionth of a second, compared to the 150-kilowatt maximum of current systems. It's also thought such a burst would disrupt nearby electronics systems, making it a functional electromagnetic pulse (EMP). The US military group is aiming to have a working prototype by August 2022.

However, in this more recent test, General Atomics did develop additional algorithms for CODE to support "behavioral functions for a coordinated air-to-air search." During the demonstration, a human operator then instructed the Avenger and its five virtual wingmen to carry out the aerial search mission, which they then performed autonomously. The CODE "engine" flew the physical Avenger drone for more than two hours, according to the company's press release. It's interesting to note that the instructions from the human operator were sent to the drone using a Tactical Targeting Network Technology (TTNT) radio via the well-established Link16 waveform. The Navy developed TTNT first for the EA-18G Growler and it is now a key component of the service's Block III upgrade package for its F/A-18E/F Super Hornets.

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Washington – The Trump administration plans to reinterpret a Cold War-era arms agreement between 34 nations with the goal of allowing U.S. defense contractors to sell more American-made drones to a wide array of nations, three defense industry executives and a U.S. official told Reuters. The policy change, which has not been previously reported, could open up sales of armed U.S. drones to less stable governments such as Jordan and the United Arab Emirates that in the past have been forbidden from buying them under the 33-year-old Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), said the U.S. official, a former U.S. official and one of the executives. It could also undermine longstanding MTCR compliance from countries such as Russia, said the U.S. official, who has direct knowledge of the policy shift. Reinterpreting the MTCR is part of a broader Trump administration effort to sell more weapons overseas. It has overhauled a broad range of arms export regulations and removed the U.S. from international arms treaties including the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the Open Skies Treaty.

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump will soon make it easier to export some types of lethal U.S.-made drones to potentially dozens more allies and partners -- including Japan -- according to people familiar with the plan. Trump is expected to ease rules for such foreign sales under a long-delayed new policy on unmanned military aircraft due to be rolled out as early as this month, the first phase of a broader overhaul of arms export regulations. U.S. drone manufacturers, facing growing competition overseas especially from Chinese and Israeli rivals who often sell under lighter restrictions, have lobbied hard for the rule changes. The White House is expected to tout the move as part of Trump's "Buy American" initiative to create jobs and reduce the U.S. trade deficit. Human rights and arms control advocates, however, warn it risks fueling violence and instability in regions such as the Middle East and South Asia.

ABU DHABI – Walking through a trade show all about military drones, Emirati officials made a point on Sunday to stop first at a stand run by Chinese officials with a mock armed drone hanging above them. Defense analysts believe that drone, the Wing Loong II, is now being used by the Emirati military while the United Arab Emirates remains barred from purchasing weaponized drones from the United States. That purchase, as well as Abu Dhabi hosting the Unmanned Systems Exhibition & Conference this week in the Emirati capital, shows the power these weapons now hold across the Middle East. Top UAE officials, including Abu Dhabi's powerful crown prince, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, were on hand for the drone conference, which opened on Sunday. The UAE, home to skyscraper-studded Dubai, already has embraced drones.

Russian hackers may have stolen years' worth of competitive advantage by swiping secrets of United States' drone and other military technology after an Associated Press (AP) investigation revealed they targeted key contract workers into exposing their emails. It is uncertain what exactly may have been stolen, but Fancy Bear (the hackers who interfered in the U.S. election) targeted at least 87 people working on militarized drones, cloud-computing platforms, stealth fighter jets, rockets, missiles, and other sensitive technology, for companies like Lockheed Martin Corp., Raytheon Co., Boeing Co., Airbus Group and General Atomics. Charles Sowell, a former senior adviser to the U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and one of Fancy Bear's targets, told the AP: "The programs that they appear to target and the people who work on those programs are some of the most forward-leaning, advanced technologies." "And if those programs are compromised in any way, then our competitive advantage and our defense is compromised. That's what's really scary," Sowell, who reviewed the list for AP, added.

Boeing recently offered a first glimpse of its newest military aircraft, a large, stingray-shaped drone it hopes will win an intense Navy competition to build an uncrewed aircraft capable of landing on an aircraft carrier. Drones have been a vital part of the Pentagon's arsenal for years, but the competition for a Navy carrier-based version that can refuel jet fighters in the midair would mark a significant advancement in the technology -- and become another sign how the military is increasingly integrating robots into the way it fights. In addition to Boeing, two of the Pentagon's top suppliers, General Atomics and Lockheed Martin, are also vying for a contract to build as many as 76 of the vehicles that would become operational in the mid 2020s. Bids are due Jan. 3, setting the stage for a high-stakes competition in 2018. Though the Navy has not yet released the value of the contract, an earlier incarnation of the effort--in which the drones would both serve as refueling aircraft and have attack capabilities -- would have been worth $3 billion through 2022.