Musk has said "it makes sense to shift super scarce SpaceX engineering and production resources to Starship to get launch rate to several times per day, which means winding down Falcon."

It may create temporary bottlenecks for access to space for companies who have relied on the Falcon 9. But the bet is an indication of SpaceX’s confidence in Starship’s maturity, and more importantly about focus.

Sequencing, not sacrifice

SpaceX isn’t walking away from the cash cow that is Falcon 9. They’re sequencing it to unlock even more capacity to orbit.

That’s sequencing discipline. SpaceX has more resources than almost anyone else in the launch sector, and still won’t run two flagship programs at once. A lot of business leaders and founders I talk to refuse to choose and sequence their growth.

Over the years, I’ve seen so much of this (and done it too) that I’ve given it a name. I call it the Focus Debt.

You won’t pay it today, you finance it by focusing on too many things at once. The interest shows up as wasted spend, confused and lukewarm customers, a team that’s matured nothing properly - you get the idea.

Here are three examples from just last month, in conversations with three very different businesses - one pre-seed with no revenue, one at seed with a small amount of revenue, and one bootstrapped with an existing product line already growing and adding meaningful recurring revenue.

The pre-seed company hadn’t worked out which segment actually is the best-fit for their technology, so were pursuing all three at once, with no way to tell which one was working.

The seed-stage founder could see two directions starting to work, and couldn’t let go of either.

The bootstrapped company already had a recurring-revenue generating product with growing demand, and kept saying yes to new products. Every time a customer asked “can you do X”, the answer was yes, because they didn’t want to leave money on the table.

The first two look like indecision - easy to spot, easy to judge. The third looks like traction, or even ambition. It’s the same constraint wearing a different costume: they’re not focusing on taking anything to its logical endgame yet. All three were opening new fronts before the first one was proven.

What it costs

For the first two, the cost shows up quickly: money and time chasing markets and prospects that were never going to close, plus something underneath it that quietly bleeds - customers and partners who can’t tell what the company actually does. Clarity is a differentiator on its own. Ambiguity doesn’t translate as flexibility to a buyer; it’s risk.

For the third, the cost hasn’t shown up yet - at least not directly. That’s what makes it dangerous. The trajectory is a small team maturing nothing properly, several half-finished product lines that do okay-ish instead of a single cash cow that could strengthen their moat, and eventually not enough resource left to finish any of them well. Recurring revenue today buys a false sense of security about tomorrow, not immunity from the accrued focus debt.

None of this is about stage or size. Pre-seed, seed, bootstrapped to Series C, IPO’d - doesn’t matter. It’s about whether a company is willing to run the sequence: find fit, prove it, mature and scale as far as it can go, before building the next thing.

Focus.

If you had to drop every segment or product line except one (or two) tomorrow, which would you keep?

One more thing before you go

Most commercialisation problems get diagnosed as a sales problem when they’re not, and that misdiagnosis is usually the first form of focus debt. I’ve built the Commercialisation Readiness Check for it to provide one clear answer on what’s blocking you. Here it is - takes less than five minutes and costs nothing.

Commercialisation Readiness Check

More next month.

More importantly, it felt more “mature” than in 2024. Maturity in emerging technologies - AI, autonomous systems, eVTOLs - but also in the way companies have been thinking about risk and resilience in the increasingly unstable geopolitical world. Supply chain pressures still exist, though they seem to have eased.

A lot of demand that had been forecasted before is starting to materialise. Farnborough Airshow is usually headlined by Boeing vs Airbus order numbers, contracts, and big announcements - I’m not going to focus on those here. This isn’t about the news from the show, it’s about the underlying patterns and what founders and executives should take from it.

Different themes, one common thread

UAS and autonomy were dominant, with most of the focus on defence and dual-use. Traditional primes and OEMs to Neo-primes and startups, all showcasing UAS from small FPV drones to large CCAs. BAE Systems unveiled its own CCA, the Brontanax.

Small, low-cost missile systems are another hardware trend showing up more often at airshows, frequently pitched for use against drones. Players like Destinus are increasingly focusing on rapid production and scalability of missile systems and are finding immense success through partnerships - for example with Rheinmetall and Thales - and with a huge financial war chest of €400M with another €200M being raised.

The emerging air taxi and eVTOL companies, usually focusing on civil and commercial markets, are pouring more money and resources into defence. Archer partnered with Anduril to unveil the Thunder autonomous attack aircraft at the show, and the UK military expressing interest for Vertical Aerospace’s Valo aircraft are two examples. Defence lets them use existing demand while sidestepping the certification hurdles that have slowed civil commercialisation. These companies have also been increasingly looking at hybrid propulsion, given the energy density limitations of batteries combined with the complexity of distributed electric propulsion.

Space has also grown and matured since the last show. It’s becoming the invisible infrastructure upon which the UAS and autonomy sit on.

No trend today is complete without AI. It has already been deployed on the frontlines and is increasingly being used in military decision making, though deployment to the factories hasn’t caught up yet. Early adopters are making progress towards scaled deployment in factories, and though there is much more to be done to make AI the norm in ADS factories, every signal points this way.

The ADS tiered supply chain has grown too, with new and established suppliers specialising in everything from propulsion and flight control systems to parts and materials. The DIP, defence procurement demand, and commercial aircraft build-rate ramp-ups are all driving that.

What remains to be seen is who can scale fast enough to meet demand. Throughout what was showcased and talked about at the show, the one common thread across these is industrialisation.

I wrote in January that 2026 wasn’t a demand problem. The week at Farnborough proved that still holds. 2026 is an industrialisation problem.

For founders and executives, the question worth asking is not "is there demand" - clearly, there is. It’s "how fast can you rise to meet it". A prime doubles their order. The MoD wants fifty units instead of five. What happens to lead times. Whether the workforce, processes, and test capacity scale with the contract or against it.

That gap is where the winners over the next few years get decided, not in whose technology is the coolest or sexiest.

Demand isn’t the constraint anymore. Production is.

Every year there’s a document like this. A big strategy paper, a spending review, an investment plan. Most of the sector reads the headline, maybe a news story or an infographic on LinkedIn, forms an opinion about whether the government is competent, and gets on with their week.

That’s a mistake if you’re building a company that sells into defence, and it’s a mistake in both directions. Assuming a document like this has nothing to do with you is as wrong as assuming your capability area is covered because it got a mention somewhere in the 81 pages.

The UK’s Defence Investment Plan came with a lot of drama, and a £28bn funding gap covered everywhere, but it’s still worth a proper read. It’s one of the clearer public statements about what the UK Defence will buy and fund over the next four years.

The document does a job most people skip

Last year’s Strategic Defence Review set out the vision - drones matter, autonomy matters, and AI-enabled capability matters, among other things. Everyone already knew about it and agreed with it.

The Defence Investment Plan is where the government’s own language says it will implement that vision. Which means it’s the place to check whether “matters” turned into a number.

Some of it did, and more specifically than the £28bn headline suggested. Over £5bn is allocated to drone transformation over four years, with £650m of that earmarked specifically for cheap, expendable autonomous systems - drones and uncrewed ground vehicles built to be produced at volume, not exquisite one-off platforms. There’s a new £100m Rapid AI Delivery Taskforce, built explicitly to get AI-enabled capability into the hands of the armed forces faster than the normal procurement process allows. Nearly £2bn sits behind the Digital Targeting Web, which is software and integration work, not hardware. £790m is going toward homeland air, drone, and missile defence - counter-drone systems, directed energy, radar and sensors, named specifically. And a new £50bn export finance facility through UK Export Finance is aimed at helping UK defence firms of any size win contracts abroad.

None of that erases the £4.7bn gap still marked “to be funded at Budget 2026.” Both things are true. There’s real, specific, funded intent in several categories, and there’s also a chunk of the total that isn’t locked in yet. A document like this rewards someone who reads closely enough to tell those two things apart, rather than picking whichever headline confirms what they already believed about the sector.

The roadmap check

Rather than finding the item closest to what you do and get excited about it, here’s a useful exercise for this week: Take your current roadmap and check it against where the funding is going and what that means for your plans.

It should trigger questions to go ask the end users, the buyers, and align to your roadmap. For example, the DIP allocates £230m out of £5bn for Autonomy on autonomous seabed warfare systems by 2030. If you’re developing USVs or UUVs, you should be figuring out what this means for you when you talk to UK Defence. If you’re supplying components or subsystems to the primes and OEMs who sell into UK Defence, now’s the time to ask if your customers’ plans are aligned with these priorities.

If what you’re building sits inside one of the priorities defined in the document, it’s worth knowing and worth reflecting on how you talk to your buyer over the next year.

If what you’re building doesn’t sit inside the priorities listed, that’s worth knowing too. It doesn’t mean your technology is wrong or your company won’t succeed. It means the growth path in the next four years, at least through UK Defence, isn’t going to be pulled along by a funded government priority, and your plan needs to account for that.

Either answer is fine. Leaders who build well-funded, well-run companies get one of these two answers all the time, and both are workable. What isn’t workable is not asking the question, and finding out eighteen months from now that your commercial strategy was leaning on a priority the funding never actually reached.

Alignment isn’t the same as being in the room

Alignment on paper is where this starts, not where it ends. If your category has a funded line in this document, the people who control that budget have almost certainly already been talking to someone about it. Procurement doesn’t start when a tender appears. It starts long before that, with whoever holds the budget deciding who they already trust enough to call.

Reading the Defence Investment Plan tells you what money exists and where it’ll be spent. It doesn’t tell you whether you’re in the room yet. If you’re not, that’s the actual work this document should trigger.

That’s also where it gets harder than going through the document once and moving on. Being in the room isn’t enough if everyone else building something similar got there first and looks the same as you on paper. And a funded line inside the UK is one buyer, not the ceiling on what this technology is worth. Both of those are worth their own proper look. This one’s about knowing whether you’re checking the right thing in the first place.

The asymmetry that matters

Reading a document like this properly, with a sharp eye to separate the funded lines from the mentions, takes an afternoon. Most people won’t spend it. They’ll read one article summarising the row over the £28bn gap, look at infographics summarising what will be funded, form an opinion, and move on with a roadmap that was never actually checked against what the UK Defence is prioritising in detail.

That gap between the leaders who read the primary document and those who read the headline and move on is a bigger edge than most realise. It costs nothing more than a few hours, perhaps a day. It just requires actually doing it.

More next month.

I say some version of this to a few companies every month who want help growing by “leveraging my network” or “getting access to my contacts.” Usually they’re from another sector trying to break into ADS, or from another region trying to get into the UK or European market.

There are plenty of consultants who offer this. And I get the appeal. But it’s almost always solving for a symptom of the problem, not the problem itself.

What’s actually being asked

When a company asks for my network access in a new market, what they mean is: can you use your relationships to help us make sales?

Sometimes that means introductions. But often it goes further than that. What they’re really asking is: can you be our sales rep in this market, because you have the relationships we don’t? Carry the conversation, manage the relationship, and get us in front of the right people.

The problem with that is twofold.

First, I have no stake in their product or their delivery - I can’t represent something I don’t own or really have any say in. Second, and more fundamentally, a sale in ADS isn’t closed by a warm introduction. It’s closed by the company demonstrating, over time, that they understand the market, the buyer’s problem, and how their product fits into it.

Behind all of this, there’s usually a missing piece - a growth strategy built on a genuine understanding of the market. Which segments? Which buyers, and why them? How do they actually buy? What will make this company different here? What will it take to win?

Most of the time, none of that has been worked through. The strategy is: we’ve decided to expand into this market, and we need doors opened.

That’s a hope, not a growth strategy.

What a warm introduction actually is

In ADS especially, a warm introduction carries both parties’ names on it. I’m not just connecting two people - I’m signalling to someone I’ve spent years building trust with that the company I’m sending them is worth their time. That signal only works because it’s selective and there is no sales-driven agenda there.

If the company doesn’t know the market well enough to have a credible positioning and a conversation, the introduction doesn’t help them. It makes things worse. They’ve used a one-time asset and left an impression that’s hard to undo.

And if it goes nowhere - because the product isn’t right for the market, or the proposition doesn’t land - they’ll blame me and my network. Not the product. That’s a dynamic I’m not willing to set up.

So when someone asks me to open doors as the first move, my answer is always the same: you’re not ready for it (yet).

The work that comes first

(skip this at your own risk)

Growing into a new region or sector in ADS requires understanding the market at a level most companies underestimate.

Who actually buys what you’re selling, and how? What does the competitive set look like from the buyer’s perspective? What are the qualification requirements, the security considerations, the domestic content expectations that shape procurement decisions here? Where is there genuine gap?

That research produces a hypothesis: here’s where we think we fit, here’s why, here’s what would need to be true for this to work. From that, you can build a real strategy - a roadmap for how you test the hypothesis, what early conversations you’re trying to have, what you’re trying to learn, and how you’d adjust if the market pushes back.

This is hard work, and usually gets skipped. Companies arrive wanting to execute before they’ve finished thinking.

The ones that get it right treat early market conversations as structured tests, not sales attempts. They go in to learn - to find the gap between what they assumed about the market and what’s actually true. Where does the proposition land well? Where does it need reframing for UK or European buyers? What operational realities hadn’t they accounted for?

That process is what builds the picture you need. And it’s what makes you ready for introductions - because by the time you’re asking for them, you know exactly what conversation you need to have.

Government programmes, matchmakers, and trade bodies

I call these the key enablers. Early on, they can help you have exploratory conversations while you’re still forming your hypothesis.

But their real value comes once you have a clear hypothesis, a tested proposition, and a genuine sense of where you fit. At that point, they accelerate something that’s already moving.

The same applies to network introductions. At that stage, you’re not asking someone to take a punt on an untested proposition. You’re asking them to shortcut a process you’ve already done most of the hard work for.

That’s a completely different conversation.The companies that skip the work don’t just fail to grow into the market. They make it harder for themselves later. Burned introductions don’t reset. A bad first impression in a market travels. And the expectations set by “we just need the right doors opened” are almost impossible to manage when the doors open and nothing is ready behind them.

Doing this properly - the research, the hypothesis, the tested proposition - isn’t the slow route. It’s the only route that actually leads somewhere.

More next month.

If you’re trying to grow into ADS - or into a new region - and you’re not sure whether you’ve done enough of this thinking yet, it’s worth a conversation.

Get in touch via email or LinkedIn.

I’ve heard this more times than I can count. A founder, a credible anchor customer behind them - an industry leader, a major OEM, a prime - and the quiet confidence that the hard part is done. If a name like that is willing to back you, the rest of the market will take notice.

True - the market will take notice. But notice isn’t the metric that matters. Engagement is.

Market-level Pain vs. Company-level Pain

A market-level pain repeats across a segment. Different organisations , different contexts, different procurement cycles - but the same underlying pain. If you’re solving one of these, you have the foundation for a great commercial strategy.

A company-level pain is real pain, but it’s just specific to one organisation. Solve it well and you have a customer, but not necessarily a market.

Early on, they’re almost impossible to tell apart. And a large, credible anchor customer makes it very easy to assume you already know which one you’re dealing with.

Their endorsement proves you can solve their version of the problem. It doesn’t prove the problem looks the same everywhere else. And it doesn’t mean their credibility transfers to procurement decisions at organisations with completely different priorities.

Usually you find that out later than you should.

What You’re Learning

Access to real users, real processes, real feedback on what the product needs to do - this is the thing most early-stage companies struggle to get.

The problem isn’t having an anchor customer. It’s what happens when their requirements become the development roadmap.

I was advising a startup last year developing AI-driven digital twin tools for aerospace structures. Novel technology solving a real pain. A large company got involved early to help accelerate development and become a future customer. By any measure, a good thing.

All development was being oriented around design and manufacturing use cases for a large engineering and manufacturing operation, because that’s who the anchor company was.

The problem was: would this translate to even bigger manufacturing operations? Or small company operations? Maybe, maybe not. The founding team didn’t know.

This technology also had potential use cases for in-service operations and MRO for structural health monitoring - arguably an even bigger longer-term market. This may have required developing the technology around different constraints and marketing with different positioning - was this true? Maybe, maybe not. The founding team didn’t know.

By the time commercialisation became the focus, the product was highly optimised for one customer and their context. It wasn’t clear how much of the broader market actually looked like their context, or what they were missing.

The question that should have been running in parallel the whole time - is this company’s problem the market’s problem? - hadn’t been asked.

Why Nobody Questions It

This isn’t a story about a bad decision. Every choice made sense.

The anchor relationship provides enough momentum to keep moving in a certain direction. Going out to the broader market feels premature when the product isn’t finished. The large company’s credibility makes their requirements feel representative.

And there’s something subtler: the founder’s proximity to the anchor customer means their vocabulary, their problem framing, even their definition of what good looks like starts to mirror that one organisation.

By the time you’re talking to buyer number two, you’re speaking a dialect only buyer number one fully understands, solving for nuances that only buyer number one has.

Conversations feel harder than they should. Objections come from unexpected directions. What worked before stops working, and it’s not obvious why.

That’s usually when the assumption gets questioned - later than it should have been.

What You Need to Find Out

The discipline that’s missing isn’t complicated to describe.

Talk to buyers you’re not already working with, early enough that what you learn can still change something. Not to validate what you’ve built. To find the variance.

Where does the problem look different from how your anchor customer described it? What does buyer number three care about that never came up with buyer number one? Which parts of your solution resonate immediately, and which parts need explaining that shouldn’t need explaining?

That variance is the data. It tells you which parts of what you’re solving are market-level - patterns that repeat, and problems that exist regardless of which organisation you’re talking to. It tells you which parts are company-level: real, but specific. Worth solving for customer one. Not the thing to build a commercial strategy around.

The companies that get this right treat their first customer as a reference point, not a blueprint. They run market conversations in parallel with product development - not to replace the anchor relationship, but to understand its edges.

The ones that don’t do this arrive at commercialisation already speaking the wrong language.

The Question Worth Asking

Your anchor customer’s endorsement is a signal. It’s just not the signal most founders think it is.

What do you know about your market that you didn’t learn from your first customer?

For most ADS companies trying to commercialise new technologies, the honest answer is: not enough.

More next month.

Are you ready to actually deliver if the MOD, or a prime, said they’d like your capability?

The demand signal right now is the loudest it’s been in decades. Iran, Ukraine, European rearmament - the opportunity is real. But opportunity and readiness are different things, and this market will make that distinction for you if you don’t make it yourself.

Defence procurement in the West is still broken, though progress is real. The problems are being acknowledged, the direction of travel is right. But we’re nowhere near solved yet. The companies that will capture this moment aren’t waiting for procurement to be fixed. They’re getting ready now, because the window - however imperfect - is real and narrowing.

Here’s what getting ready actually means.

Technology is not a product

A pattern I keep seeing across deeptech and dual-use companies: they have genuinely capable, interesting technology. The physics works. The TRL is credible.

Getting from technology to product requires something most grant cycles don’t fund or require: sustained, iterative engagement with end users throughout development. Not just a requirements capture at the start or a demonstration at the end. Real engagement, throughout, that shapes what gets built and why.

Most grant frameworks allow for end user involvement. The option is there.

What I keep seeing instead: end users brought in late, after the core architecture is set. End users are treated as validators rather than co-developers. Worse still: roadmaps shaped around what the next funding round requires rather than what operational reality demands. The technology development progresses, but the problem it’s solving drifts quietly away from what end users actually need.

By the time commercialisation becomes the focus, the gap is real. Every sales conversation is harder than it should be. The demand signal is there. The product isn’t quite meeting it.

A product is not a capability

This is the part that gets said less often, and it matters more right now than it ever has.

Defence doesn’t buy products. It buys capability.

A product meets a set of requirements and can be reproduced. A capability is what the product, or a set of products working as a system enable. Every system, subsystem, and components need to ultimately enable the required capability.

A company that has a product but hasn’t done the work to understand where it sits in the capability stack will keep having the wrong conversations. Talking about what their technology does when the customer needs to understand what operational problem it solves, at what scale, integrated with what else, qualified to what standard. Presenting features when the procurement team needs to see fit within a programme.

The demand signal from this conflict is for capability. Not technology. Not products. Capability. A louder signal doesn’t make those conversations easier. It just exposes the gap faster.

Capability has to be developed with end users, not presented to them

The companies that get this right didn’t arrive at capability conversations after the fact.

They had end users and procurement shaping their roadmap from early on. Requirements, operational context, and Iterative feedback that meant by the time the product was ready, the capability case was already understood by the people who needed to buy it.

I’ve watched companies get this wrong at every stage - startups that built for grant panels instead of operators, scaleups that hit commercialisation and discovered their product solved a problem the market had moved on from, established suppliers that could demonstrate technical capability but couldn’t articulate where they sat in the programme architecture.

The ongoing conflicts have compressed the timeline, programmes are accelerating, and supply chain positions are being set. The window to establish yourself as a credible capability provider is shorter than it was year ago. Getting end users and procurement into your development process now, if they aren’t already, isn’t optional. It’s the work.

Speed, flexibility, and capability positioning

Those are the three things that will determine who wins right now.

Speed to move before the window closes. Flexibility to iterate when operational requirements shift. And genuine capability positioning: knowing where you fit in the stack, being able to articulate it to the people making decisions, and having the development history to back it up.

One or two of those won’t be enough. You need all three.

The Iran conflict has made the opportunity real and urgent. It hasn’t made any company more ready than they were last year. These moments don’t repeat on a convenient timeline. In defence, missing this window doesn’t mean waiting months. It means waiting years.

More next month.

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Reasonable thing to do. Getting capable small companies into defence has been genuinely difficult, and fixing that matters.

What I keep thinking about as budgets expand across Europe: winning contracts is only half the problem.

Europe now accounts for over 21% of global defence spending, up from 17% in 2022. German defence spending alone passed $100 billion in 2025, a $21 billion increase on the year before. That money is moving into procurement. Contracts are going to flow to small and mid-sized OEMs and suppliers faster than at any point in recent memory.

But here’s what will happen next. A wave of small and mid-sized suppliers are about to win work they haven't fully prepared to deliver. Not because they're incompetent. Because the industry conversation, including the UK MOD’s initiative, is almost entirely focused on the front end. Win rates, pipeline, access, and getting in the door.

What happens after signature barely gets mentioned. That’s where I keep seeing companies break.

The bid machine

Most small and mid-sized OEMs and suppliers I’ve worked with have spent years getting very good at one thing: pursuing contracts.

Bid management. Proposal quality. Customer relationships. The ability to put a competitive response together in a compressed timeline against strong competition. That capability is genuinely hard-won.

The bid machine and the delivery machine are different things. They require different processes, different disciplines, different leadership attention. In most growing ADS businesses, one of them has had almost all the investment. You probably know which one.

And here's what I keep noticing: the higher the win rate, the less visible the problem tends to be. If you're winning 60-70% of competitive bids, it feels like the machine is working. It might just mean you're bidding work you already know you can get. The strongest suppliers I've worked with win around 35-45%, going after genuinely competitive work, against primes and peers with comparable capability. A very high win rate often means you're staying comfortable, not growing.

What the bid review room actually sounds like

Over the years, I’ve been in enough bid review meetings - red team, blue team, pink team - you name it.

Sales, engineering, operations, programme leadership all in the room. The question is “can we deliver this?” Engineering says technically feasible. Operations says they’d scale up. Leadership says win it first, resource it properly after.

Everyone leaves with the same quiet assumption: we’ll figure it out if we win it.

And they do figure it out - through overtime, weekend work, heroics, hiring mid-programme. But here’s what I’ve noticed: “we’ll figure it out” is treated as a plan when it’s actually a risk transfer. The risk doesn’t disappear at signature. It just moves from the bid team to the delivery team, unassessed and unpriced. No honest view of what needs to happen between signature and delivery readiness. No reckoning with what figuring it out costs in time, money, and the team capacity.

Delivery just inherits it. Quietly, every time.

Six months later

A pattern I’ve seen more than once: A UAS components supplier won their biggest contract after a competitive bid they’d invested heavily in. Genuine capability. Production-ready on paper. They could reliably produce around 30 proximity and IMU sensor modules per month. They bid 80, with aggressive timelines.

First three months looked fine. Overtime became normal - no one escalated it because nothing had technically failed yet.

Month four, schedule slipped. Sensors failing thermal cycling and EMC tests. Customer asking questions about QC and traceability. Leadership pushed harder. More technicians, more hours. More people just meant more coordination overhead on processes that were never built for volume.

By month seven: customer trust gone, margins evaporated, team burnt out.

Sales got blamed, but leadership approved the bid, engineering confirmed feasibility, and operations committed to scaling.

Nobody had asked the question that actually mattered:
Are we systematically ready for 80 units, or are we technically capable and quietly hoping to close the gap?

The cost of closing it - overtime, emergency hires, quality failures, a customer relationship that took years to build - never appeared in the bid. Delivery inherited all of it.

The part nobody’s helping you with

The UK MOD’s new initiative is doing exactly what it should: removing friction and getting capable small companies in front of defence buyers.

But preparing to deliver that work is the company’s problem. Process maturity, quality governance, programme management depth - the systems that determine whether winning a contract builds the business or quietly hollows it out. Nobody can build those for you. And the time to build them isn’t after you’ve won, it’s before the next bid goes in.

The strongest suppliers I’ve worked with treat delivery readiness with the same rigour as bid quality. They ask what “figuring it out” will cost before signature, not after. They make a deliberate decision about whether that cost is priced in.

Before your next bid goes in

What's the real gap between your current capability and production-ready processes at the volume you're bidding? How long does it take your organisation to get from signature to real delivery momentum - and is that gap widening? What has "figuring it out" actually cost you across programmes in the last 12 months?

Most companies can’t answer that last question. Not because the data doesn’t exist. Because nobody’s sat down to look.

That number, whatever it is, is what you're about to bid again.

More next month.

And somewhere in the room, quietly, the organisation is already breaking.

Growth in aerospace, defence, and space rarely fails because companies can’t sell. It fails because the entire leadership conversation is pointed in the wrong direction - at pipeline, at business development, at the next contract - while delivery capacity silently erodes behind them. By the time it becomes visible, it’s already expensive.

Not faster than people can work harder. Faster than programme governance, supplier coordination, engineering throughput, quality oversight, and leadership attention can stretch without breaking.

This doesn’t show up as a crisis. It just builds. By the time it’s visible externally, the damage is already done.

What this looks like inside before anyone calls it a problem

This is how it usually starts.

Contracts close in Q4. Revenue gets booked. The pipeline still looks healthy.

Programme kick-off slips. Four weeks becomes eight. Eight becomes twelve. No one escalates it because nothing has actually “failed.”

Programme managers take on one more programme. Then another. Oversight turns into coordination. Coordination turns into standing meetings. Those meetings replace actual programme management.

Engineering can still deliver, technically. But delivery now happens alongside live programmes, bid support, supplier issues from the last contract, and late customer changes.

Something has to give. Usually it’s margin, robustness, or thinking ahead.

Quality reviews don’t disappear. They just get deferred. Supplier issues aren’t missed. They’re discovered later, when they’re louder and cost more to fix.

Leadership meetings change. Less forward planning. More status updates. More reassurance that things are “under control.” Someone says “we need better visibility”, but nobody has the bandwidth to actually build it.

Nothing here looks dramatic. Each decision makes sense at the time. Together, they create a gap between commitments and capacity that no dashboard is tracking.

Why leadership often misses it

Honestly, this is the part that frustrates me most.

Three reasons this stays invisible longer than it should.

Commercial success masks the strain: Sales keeps winning. Customers stay engaged. From the outside, momentum looks good. Internally, the strain is spread across programmes and functions, so it never quite becomes a board-level signal.

The degradation happens gradually: There’s no single breaking point. Capacity erodes through small, reasonable compromises. Each one buys time. Collectively, they mortgage the future.

Most responses add load instead of capacity: When delivery pressure rises, organisations add reporting, escalation, oversight. These consume the bandwidth that’s already stretched. The system gets louder, not stronger.

One signal that confirms the pattern

Look at Airbus.

Roughly 8,700 aircraft in backlog (as of January 2026). At current delivery rates, that’s over a decade of work. They know its a delivery capacity problem, and they’re actively working with the suppliers to increase build rates, investing in coordination infrastructure, managing the constraint explicitly.

But Airbus has the scale, visibility, and resources to treat this as a known variable. They can see it clearly and invest accordingly.

For Tier 2 and Tier 3 suppliers, the same constraint exists - contracts signed faster than capacity can absorb them - but it’s harder to see and easier to rationalise as ‘normal friction’ until something breaks externally.

What prepared companies do differently

They don’t slow down sales. They don’t avoid growth.

They just treat delivery capacity as a constraint that deserves the same attention as pipeline.

They track how long it actually takes to mobilise a programme after signature. They model programme management load instead of assuming it stretches forever. They invest in supplier coordination and quality governance before volume forces the issue. They give leadership visibility into delivery stress, not just revenue momentum.

The difference between companies that scale cleanly and companies that break isn’t opportunity. It’s readiness.

The questions that matter right now

If contracts are being signed at pace, ask yourself:

• How long is the gap between contract signature and real programme mobilisation, and how fast is it widening?

• How many programmes is each programme manager actually governing, not just nominally assigned?

• What work is being deferred today to keep delivery looking fine this quarter?

• Which risks are moving downstream quietly because nobody has capacity to surface them?

Most organisations I’ve worked with already knew the answers. They just hadn’t made the questions official yet.

This is not a forecast. Forecasts are for people who believe the future is something that happens to them. This is a diagnostic for those currently building it.

As we enter 2026, the industry is suffering from a dangerous paradox: record demand paired with structural stagnation. We are attempting to meet 21st-century sovereign needs using 20th-century organisational silos.

The following six shifts are the new physics of our sector. You can either align your operating model with them now, or wait for the load-bearing walls of your organisation to crack under the pressure of a backlog you cannot ship.

#1 Commercial Aviation: From Backlogs to Choke Points

Passenger traffic is up and order books are full. That is no longer the story. The story is that we have hit the ceiling of industrial throughput.

The constraint now sits in the “un-sexy” middle: MRO capacity, casting foundries, and the fragile solvency of Tier-2 suppliers. Aircraft are staying in service longer not because it is optimal, but because delivery slots have become mythical. Engine MRO is expected to absorb over 53% of global MRO value by 2035. We are effectively running a global “keep-it-flying” mission rather than a fleet renewal.

What this means:

• In 2026, growth accrues to those who can execute, not those who can sell.

• Backlog without throughput is a liability, not a comfort.

The Reality: Success is determined on the shop floor, not the sales floor.

#2 Defence: Speed is the Only Performance Metric

Defence spending has found a higher structural floor across the US, Europe, and the Indo-Pacific. But the KPI has shifted. The question is no longer how refined a platform looks on a slide deck, but how quickly an integrated capability can be fielded and updated.

Software and AI matter for exactly one reason: they compress time. This is why investment is flowing into “the boring stuff”: logistics, automated sustainment, and readiness, rather than standalone tech demos.

What this means:

• Credibility is earned by tempo.

• Organizations that cannot marry software agility with hardware discipline will struggle to convert budgets into outcomes.

The Reality: “Slideware” maturity is no longer mistaken for operational readiness.

#3 Re-Industrialisation: Flexibility Over Efficiency

The defence industrial base is being reshaped into something “blended.” Static, defence-only factories cannot surge. We are seeing a return to a WWII-style industrial logic where commercial and defence lines are intertwined to allow for sudden “burst” capacity.

At the same time, “the factory follows the fight.” Expeditionary manufacturing, i.e. 3D printing spares at the edge and secure digital threads, is now a requirement of contested logistics.

What this means:

• The Capital Shift: You cannot “Lean” your way out of a supply chain crisis. 2026 rewards redundancy and adaptability.

• Organisations that cannot reconfigure lines in weeks are structurally misaligned.

The Reality: Resilience now outperforms narrow cost-optimisation.

#4 Space: The Sovereign Infrastructure Load-Test

Space has crossed the chasm from strategic curiosity to critical infrastructure, treated with the same gravity as energy or telecoms.

Sovereign constellations are scaling, and Europe is reorganising its industrial stack (Project Bromo) to compete. As capital markets prepare to reprice space as a durable asset class, bolstered by a potential SpaceX IPO, the transition will be violent for those unprepared. Infrastructure reveals the organisational weaknesses that “experiments” could hide.

What this means:

• Failures in 2026 will be organisational, not technical.

• Scaling exposes weak decision rights and brittle supply chains.

The Reality: Strategic ambiguity becomes expensive when the world expects 99.9% uptime.

#5 Satcom: The Death of the “Static Beam”

LEO is no longer disruptive; it is the baseline. As non-GEO capacity dominates, selling raw bandwidth has become a race to the bottom.

The value has migrated upward to orchestration. Differentiation now sits in the ability to join orbits, networks, and services into a single, software-defined service. Direct-to-Device (D2D) is moving from a safety gimmick to a core telco revenue driver.

What this means:

• Connectivity is a component, not the product.

• If you are still thinking in single-orbit silos, your margins are already evaporating.

The Reality: Incremental change applied too slowly compounds disadvantage.

#6 Digital Sustainment: The End of “Hero-Based” Execution

Across ADS, AI and digital twins are no longer “innovation initiatives.” They are prerequisites for managing complexity.

Manual coordination and siloed data cannot survive the 2026 tempo. Predictive maintenance and data-driven planning now underpin basic delivery performance. The failure mode is no longer a lack of tools, it is the refusal to change behaviour.

What this means:

• Digital competence is assumed. If you have to pitch it, you’ve already lost.

• Treating AI as a “side project” ensures you will hit a scaling limit you cannot diagnose.

The Reality: Complexity punishes optimism faster than it used to.

A Counter-View: Where the Comfortable Narratives Break

Most commentary heading into 2026 agrees on the surface facts. The failure mode is not ignorance; it is interpretation. Here are the narratives that sound prudent inside the boardroom, but fail on the shop floor:

1. “The bottlenecks are temporary”

This belief justifies waiting. It treats supply chain friction as a cyclical annoyance that will “normalise” by Q4. In reality, higher fleet utilisation, contested logistics, and blended manufacturing have shifted the baseline permanently.

The Reality: The bottlenecks are structural. Treating them as temporary guarantees you will be under-equipped when the next surge hits.

2. “We can innovate at the edge without changing the core”

This produces “Innovation Labs” and pilot programs that look great in annual reports but never hit the production line. It avoids the hard work of changing program governance and decision rights.

The Reality: Without changing the core operating model, innovation is just theatre. It doesn’t scale; it just consumes overhead.

3. “Backlog equals security”

A decade-long order book feels like a warm blanket. But under execution constraints, a massive backlog is actually a massive short position on labor, energy, and raw materials. It locks you into yesterday’s pricing with tomorrow’s risk.

The Reality: In 2026, backlog without throughput is exposure. It is a promise you can’t keep that prevents you from taking the next better opportunity.

4. “Efficiency will save us”

Lean thinking dominated the predictable 2010s. Today’s environment rewards redundancy, adaptability, and “just-in-case” inventory. Efficiency without resilience creates brittle systems that shatter the moment a Tier-3 supplier in a conflict zone goes dark.

The Reality: Resilience now outperforms narrow cost-optimisation under stress.

5. “We can sequence change safely”

The “first stabilise, then digitise, then innovate” approach sounds disciplined. But in 2026, things do not calm down. Waiting for stability ensures your digital transformation arrives three years too late to matter.

The Reality: Sequential transformation increases risk. Systems, tools, and operating models must evolve together while under load.

6. “We have time to adjust”

Strong demand creates psychological comfort. It delays the difficult conversations about headcount, CAPEX, and structural reorganisation, until a program reset or margin collapse forces your hand.

The Reality: 2026 is not the early stage. It is when misalignment starts to compound visibly. By the time you feel the pain, your optionality is gone.

Stepping Back

2025 confirmed that the orbital and defence economies are real. 2026 is about alignment. The organisations that win will not wait for clarity. They will treat these shifts as a design brief for how they build, govern, and scale.

Because in 2026, demand does not create safety. It exposes misalignment.

This is a NY’26 special edition. For more context, read this:

Drones and autonomy are becoming an ever increasing part of aerospace & defence. So, before looking ahead to what 2026 will look like, let’s revisit 2025. More specifically what I said would happen in 2025 vs. what actually happened.

Here' is what I said a year ago:

Let’s see how I did.

#1 More Drones and Counter-Drones for the Military

My core argument was simple: Ukraine, Middle East, wider conflicts, and China-related tensions would keep defence-related demand for drones and counter-drones high through 2025. That turned out to be correct, and arguably understated.

Drones are now a key part of the industrial-scale warfare. Ukraine moved towards producing and fielding millions of FPV drones annually, treating them less like platforms and more like consumable munitions. Russia responded in kind, integrating low-cost drones into both tactical and strategic concepts. Scalable volume capability, not elegance, defines effectiveness. Kremlin can now produce 3-4 million drones annually (up from 1.4 million in 2024).

NATO and partners followed suit. The UK- and Latvia-led Drone Coalition, €2.75 bn committed, one million drones pledged. That is not experimentation, that is institutionalisation. Drones are now a core budget line, not a bolt-on.

Counter-drone followed the same logic. The “Tom & Jerry” dynamic accelerated: sensors, EW, kinetic effectors, and command-and-control being pulled together into layered systems. The UK’s £140m rapid funding push is a great example: governments are no longer debating if counter-UAS is required, but how fast can it be fielded and scaled.

Verdict: Correct on direction, conservative on scale. Drones are now central to force design and defence industrial policy.

#2 “Drones as First Responders” (DFR) Unleashed

I argued that 2025 is the year DFR would properly accelerate, especially in US policing. That largely happened, helped by regulatory streamlining that cut approval timelines from months to days.

By late 2025, DFR was no longer a novelty. Departments like Redmond, San Francisco and Lakewood weren’t talking about pilots; they were talking about dispatch integration, response-time reduction, and better information before officers arrive. DFR is maturing into an operating model.

Medical drones did progress, but more slowly and unevenly. Deliveries of AEDs, blood and medical supplies expanded, enabled by better connectivity and autonomy, but largely as regional programmes rather than systemic infrastructure. Directionally right, but optimistic if read as “mainstream by end-2025”.

Criminal use, unfortunately, did exactly what was expected. Prison contraband drops, reconnaissance ahead of crimes: the same tools lowering friction for responders are lowering friction for criminals too.

Verdict: Directionally accurate. Law-enforcement DFR genuinely scaled; medical use grew but stayed patchy; criminal misuse reinforced the logic for both.

#3 Need for Alternative Supply Chains that Scale

The prediction here was that geopolitics would push the US and Europe to reduce reliance on Chinese drones and components (particularly DJI and Autel) without achieving full decoupling.

That is almost exactly what happened. The FCC’s decision to add DJI and Autel to the Covered List was the clearest signal yet that security concerns are now shaping markets, not just rhetoric. It operationalised what had been abstract risk.

Crucially, the issue extended beyond airframes to subsystems and communications, matching my original argument. At the same time, China continued to signal its own leverage via export controls on key materials.

What did not happen was a clean break. DJI remains dominant in many non-defence commercial segments, for good technical and economic reasons. Western alternatives are growing, but they are still catching up on scale, maturity and ecosystem depth.

Verdict: Correct on triggers and direction. 2025 was about starting the shift, not finishing it.

#4 More “AI this, AI that”

AI was always going to dominate the narrative. The more interesting question was whether substance would follow.

On the defence side, it did. AI moved from marketing language into planning documents, operational concepts, and procurement logic. particularly around autonomy, sensor fusion, targeting and swarm behaviour. Edge AI, not cloud AI, became the centre of gravity.

2025 saw a clear push toward onboard processing: low-power chips running vision, navigation and decision-support directly on the vehicle. For investors, AI-enabled autonomy became a core valuation driver, not a nice-to-have.

On the commercial /non-defence sectors, the constraints I flagged held. Edge AI deployments expanded in inspection and surveying, but full autonomy in dense airspace remained bounded by regulation and risk tolerance.

Verdict: Accurate. AI remained noisy, but also materially reshaped defence capability and platform economics.

#5 Slow Roasted Regulations

I described 2025 as a year of incremental regulatory progress rather than breakthrough. That framing aged well.

The FAA’s Part 108 process advanced, culminating in a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), but did not deliver a fully operational BVLOS regime. Europe continued along its U-space trajectory, expanding corridors and trials without a single “unlock” moment.

Frustrating? Yes. Predictable? Also yes.

Verdict: Almost exactly right. Meaningful progress, no sudden step-change.

Plus: M&A and the rise of “dual use”

I flagged a unifying investment theme: “Dual use”. It ended up being the organising logic of 2025. Examples here, here, and here.

M&A and partnerships clustered around AI-enabled drones, counter-UAS, and systems that span defence, homeland security and public safety. Defence-adjacent deal flow dominated; cargo and logistics continued, but with less gravitational pull than I expected.

Verdict: Directionally right. Dual use was the lens through which most serious capital was deployed.

So, did 2025 happen as expected?

Overall, yes. More or less. Where I missed was on speed, not structure and direction. Medical drones and cargo M&A moved slower; supply-chain shifts began but didn’t resolve; regulation plodded rather than leapt.

The bigger picture held: drones are now industrial-scale, dual-use, AI-enabled systems sitting at the intersection of defence, security and critical infrastructure. That is the baseline reality heading into 2026.

In a follow-up, I have outlined what I think 2026 will look like for aerospace, defence, and space more broadly. Not as predictions for their own sake, but as indicators of where organisational constraints are likely to surface next.

Read it here:

Here’s an AI-generated image of fictional modern aerospace and space vehicles:

This post sets the scene for what Beyond Line of Sight (BLOS) is focused on this year and why it matters.

How Beyond Line of Sight Has Evolved

Beyond Line of Sight started in Sep 2024 as a simple aggregation of news in the drone sector. The problem was information overload and signal scarcity, something that still persists today.

As my work expanded across aerospace, defence, and space, the briefing expanded with it. But the more meaningful shift wasn’t coverage, it was focus.

Across dozens of organisations globally, from start-ups and scale-ups to tiered suppliers and primes, the same pattern keeps appearing. Companies operating in similar markets, facing similar demand, see very different growth outcomes.

The difference is rarely access to opportunity. It’s the organisation’s ability to identify and resolve growth constraints.

That pattern is pushing BLOS to evolve.

What This Briefing Focuses On Now

Aerospace, defence, and space companies are constantly launching new products, announcing partnerships, and winning contracts. From the outside, growth still looks like a sales problem:

Win more tenders. Hire more BD capacity. Expand into new markets.

Sometimes it is. But in practice, that’s rarely where growth breaks.

More often, constraints sit elsewhere:

• Products that no longer fit how customers actually buy

• Processes that can’t absorb scale, regulatory load, or programme complexity

• People, incentives, and decision-making structures misaligned with where the market is going next

• Commercial commitments that quietly outpace delivery capability

These issues are usually invisible early on. By the time they surface, teams have often already doubled down on sales and expansion. Growth becomes noisy, expensive, and stressful, not because the opportunity isn’t real, but because the organisation isn’t ready for it.

BLOS now exists to make those constraints visible before they become crises.

Why This Briefing Exists in 2026

In 2026, demand is not the problem in aerospace, defence, and space.

Industrialisation pressure, delivery risk, capital discipline, organisational coherence, and commercial execution capacity are.

As these markets evolve, growth is increasingly constrained at the interfaces between sales and delivery, between ambition and execution, and between strategy and how work actually gets done.

The cost of misalignment is higher than it used to be. The margin for error is smaller.

This is where many growth narratives quietly break down and where leadership teams often have the least visibility.

That’s the gap this briefing exists to close.

What BLOS Is (and Is Not)

Beyond Line of Sight is not a monthly market update or a news digest.

It’s a growth readiness lens.

Each edition uses real signals from aerospace, defence, and space to help you:

• spot trends that will stress internal capability

• recognise readiness gaps before they constrain growth

• pressure-test alignment across market, product, process, and people

Think of it as a short, regular prompt to step back from execution and ask: Are we actually set up to grow without breaking?

What’s Coming Next

Over the next two weeks, as a new year special, I’ll focus on two pieces.

First (Jan 12, 2026), I’ll revisit what I expected the drone industry to face in 2025, reviewing it against what actually happened, based on my post here:

Then (Jan 19, 2026), I’ll outline what I think 2026 will look like for aerospace, defence, and space more broadly.

Not as predictions for their own sake, but as indicators of where organisational constraints are likely to surface next.

If you haven’t subscribed yet, here’s your chance:

Subscribe now

I hope your 2026 business plans are ready for execution or at least being planned.

This month, my focus has been on events in the UAE, Europe, and the UK.

Read on.

The Third Pole: Industrialising UAE A&D

November’s Dubai Airshow showcased the UAE’s ambition and the rising weight of the region in global aerospace and defence. Themes revolved around drones, autonomy, and AI, seasoned with a pinch of space tech—similar to Paris, Farnborough, Bengaluru, and beyond.

The difference is the speed. The UAE is moving at a staggering pace, amplified by ambition backed by serious capital. EDGE alone unveiled 42 new systems across autonomy, weapons, propulsion, space, radar, and secure comms. They announced over $7bn in commitments and 21 partnerships with Anduril, L3Harris, Leonardo, and Lockheed. Tawazun added $6.65bn in deals. And that’s just the headlines.

What’s emerging is not a UAE caught between Western and Chinese suppliers—it’s the UAE building a third pole: an independent industrial centre that forges balanced partnerships across blocs while developing platforms that increasingly compete with Western, Chinese, and other offerings. This is powered by Abu Dhabi’s sovereign funds, acting not as passive investors but as long-horizon industrial architects.

The UAE is betting big on sovereign industrialisation: localisation, tech transfer, and deep supply chains built with both Western and non-Western partners.

For A&D suppliers, the window of opportunity in the Middle East is very real. Those who plug in now will ride this wave well into the 2030s.

CM25: Europe’s Sovereign Space

The ESA Ministerial Council 2025 concluded with a record €22 billion approved by member states. This historic funding underscores a clear focus on self-reliance and dual-use capabilities, reflected in the oversubscription for Space Transportation alongside investments in Earth Observation, secure communications, and PNT.

The same infrastructure now underpins civil programmes, scientific missions, and defence applications — from ISR to secure satellite connectivity. Europe is moving toward a resilient, sovereign space ecosystem, reducing reliance on US and foreign launch and service providers.

While it’s disappointing that Human and Robotic Exploration remains undersubscribed, this likely reflects rising economic and political pressures across the UK, Europe, and beyond rather than a lack of ambition.

For European space companies, the takeaway is clear: programmes and supply chains tied to launchers, dual-use technologies, and secure infrastructure represent the most immediate and high-impact opportunities. ESA is a strategic anchor for a sovereign, commercially competitive, and defence-relevant European space sector.

UK Space: Act Now or Lose Out

From Europe, now to the UK. The House of Lords published its report on the UK Space Industry in early November. It couldn’t be clearer: ‘Act Now or Lose Out’. It’s a message the sector has repeated for years: UK ambition in space far outpaces investment, focus, and delivery.

The UK once had sovereign launch capability and gave it up. Repeating this mistake is national security suicide. Launch access is Critical National Infrastructure, and it should be treated, funded, and secured as such. But the UK can never match the US, China, or India on launch cadence or orbital range. Geography and scale make that impossible.

Instead, the UK needs to take a long-term, strategic view and double down on the parts of the space economy where the UK already leads and where the future value will concentrate.

The future isn’t Earth-to-orbit. Access to space is no longer the bottleneck. The next frontier is space-to-Earth and space-to-space: building capability, services, and infrastructure that connect, sustain, and scale activity in orbit.

This is where the UK has real leverage: in ISAM, advanced manufacturing, space science, systems engineering, and policy and governance. These strengths matter not just commercially, but for defence and national resilience.

Given the economic and political climate, the UK needs to focus on dual-use technologies and the supply chains that enable them. UK-based companies should align their efforts with these national strengths while delivering solutions that serve both commercial and defence needs.

What’s More:

Three high profile crashes: Tejas LCA crashed during Dubai Airshow 2025 killing Wing Commander Namansh Syal, 20 fatalities as Turkish Air Force C-130 breaks apart mid-air, and a UPS MD-11 cargo plane crashed shortly after takeoff in the US, killing at least 12 people.

The U.S. Air Force launches a program to develop affordable anti-air missiles targeting $500k per unit, aiming to scale capabilities for large-scale conflicts.

The Trump administration is pressuring Congress to grant sweeping new powers to shoot down drones at public events, critical infrastructure, and prisons.

The U.S. Army aims to buy at least a million drones in the next two to three years and could acquire anywhere from a half million drones to millions of them annually in the years that follow.

Britain is providing military support to Belgium following a series of suspected Russian drone incursions into Belgian airspace.

Boeing is set to end production of three aircraft in 2027: the F/A-18 Super Hornet, the Boeing 767-300F freighter, and the Boeing 777F.

USAF plans to reduce its F-35 purchases until 2028 due to upgrade issues and financial constraints and is prioritising the development of the F-47, with the first prototype flight expected in 2028.

EHang has successfully completed a series of trial air taxi flights with its EH216-S pilotless electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing (eVTOL) aircraft in the core district of Doha, Qatar.

Archer Aviation has successfully completed an in-country eVTOL flight test campaign for its Midnight aircraft in the UAE’s local operating environment and over desert areas.

China’s experimental Shijian-21 and Shijian-25 satellites have separated in geosynchronous orbit after being docked for months conducting apparent low-profile on-orbit refuelling tests.

Jeff has had a good month: Blue Origin’s New Glenn launches NASA’s ESCAPADE spacecraft to Mars while successfully recovering the booster.

Project Kuiper becomes Amazon Leo ahead of LEO broadband service debut.

A Soyuz launch to the ISS causes damage to the Baikonur launch pad, delaying subsequent flights.

Rocket Lab has pushed the first launch of its medium-lift Neutron rocket to 2026.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Adit is the founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy and business development consulting firm specialising in helping companies grow faster in aerospace, defence, and space sectors.

Get in touch with Adit via LinkedIn.

Lots happened in October, but here are my three things that matter for A&D:

1. A New European Giant

2. The never-ending game of countering drones

3. Opportunities for shaping defence

Read on below.

A New European Giant

Airbus, Thales, and Leonardo signed an MoU to merge their space businesses into a new company. The aim is to strengthen Europe’s strategic autonomy in space. This is the boldest move in European A&D sector since MBDA.

This has spurred a comparison SpaceX / Starlink (some examples: 1, 2). It’s not about competing with SpaceX and Starlink, it’s about competing globally. And Starlink happens to be the biggest player. (it does help that mentioning Starlink, SpaceX, or Musk drives clicks)

The world is becoming less open and more polarised. On-shoring is the theme of the decade. This is not about competing with SpaceX or Starlink. This is about staying relevant and competitive globally while serving sovereign interests.

The U.S. benefits from a massive internal market from the space sector. Other nations like India and China are also fast growing in capabilities and demand. Markets like these are often large, mostly unified, and allow many players to thrive.

The European space sector is, by contrast, more fragmented. Each European nation state has its own funding, interests, and political needs. These issues won’t go away with a merger but it will streamline operations and products. It will allow the new European super-prime (and Europe) to be more competitive. If well executed…

This does risk squeezing out Europe’s SMEs. The go-ahead still depends on union and regulatory approval among other things.

One thing is certain: the European space sector will look very different by the end of the decade. This is because global competition, internal pressures, and a focus on defence are increasing.

The Never-ending Game of Countering Drones

In a few short years, drones became standard operating practice on the battlefield. Ukraine now deploys 9000 drones daily and faces volleys of 800+ drones at a time from Russia. The rest of the world is playing catch-up and learning from Ukraine, fast adopting drones.

This means the demand for counter-drone solutions is only going up. Few examples from last month:

1. US Army to hold recurring competitions to field counter-drone tech

2. Europe’s “Drone Wall” Recast: The Urgency of Drone Defense in Light of Recent Incursions

3. AeroVironment secures a $96 million U.S. Army contract to produce counter-drone missiles

Drone and counter-drone tech development is a cat-and-mouse game. We now have a wide-range of solutions. From RF-based soft-kill solutions to drone-interceptor missiles for hard-kill. There is also a rotating barbed wire fence used by Ukraine to counter fibre-optic drones.

The issue is now two-fold:

1. Understanding the adversary’s fast-improving drone capabilities

2. Putting solutions in place fast to counter the capabilities.

Oftentimes, sheer swarm sizes can defeat the counter-drones systems. This is what Russia has been doing in Ukraine. The challenge is developing inter-operable, integrated system-of-systems that can scale for effective response. This is what Europe’s “Drone Wall” should be.

This is a problem exclusive to the front-lines. Prisons, airports, and other critical national infrastructure also have the same needs. The need for effective counter-drone solutions outstrips the need for more drones.

Observations and Opportunities in Defence

September was DSEI, October was AUSA, European Defence Week, and other events. These events have made two things clear for the West:

• We need more speed — crucial and non-negotiable in the world we’re in today. Both in capability delivery and decision-making.

• We need more secure supply chains — a bottleneck that needs addressing. Without this, reliable, resilient scaling up of capability is not possible.

  • This isn’t only for physical manufacturing, but cyber domain as well. E.g. North Korea has been targeting the European defence and UAV sector in cyber-espionage.

Speed and security result from implementing the right policy, regulations, and procurement processes. Governments need these to buy fast.

Companies need capability (skills and funding) to scale fast. With the increasing demand, here are my top five areas of opportunities within defence:

1. Counter-drone and counter-UXV tech — ‘bot-on-bot’ warfare is becoming a reality and the norm.

2. Stealth-capable drones and unmanned vehicles — demand driven by the wave of counter-drone tech.

3. Advanced manufacturing — ensure the supply chain can meet integrators, OEMs, and primes’ demands.

4. Powertrains and propulsion — piston engines, gas turbines, DC motors, rocket motors, etc.

5. Software and hardware for AI and autonomy to enable ‘bot-on-bot’ warfare

(The silent sixth: space-based capability. But that’s for another day)

None of this is surprising.

It is confirmation of the trend becoming the norm. Companies should leverage these opportunities for their growth.

What’s More:

Organised crime gangs in the UK are deploying “super-drones” capable of carrying tens of kilograms, raising fears of drone-facilitated prison breaks.

Stark Defence reportedly missed all four of its attempted drone strike tests in a recent proving round.

The UK and Ukraine agreed to jointly produce thousands of Octopus-100 interceptor combat drones, and more than 85,000 military drones have been delivered by the UK to Ukraine in just six months

Altitude Angel entered administration, putting the UK’s drone UTM and operator services at risk.

The Metro Police launched a new drone programme aimed at improving public safety in London.

Russia converted American-made Cessna aircraft into low-cost anti-drone fighters.

The Pentagon is leaning on government-owned, commercially operated (known as GOCO) satellites to mitigate risks amid geopolitical conflicts.

The European Commission is considering inviting Ukraine to join Europe’s GovSatCom secure satellite communications platform.

Iridium has dropped its $1 billion 2030 service revenue goal in light of SpaceX’s push for direct-to-device connectivity.

Europe confirmed its “European Space Shield” defence programme will become operational by 2026.

SpaceX successfully completed its 11th Starship test flight.

India’s HAL will build the Sukhoi Superjet 100 locally under a new industrial tie-up.

Sweden is supplying Gripen fighters to Ukraine in a defence deal supporting Kyiv’s air power.

EHang launched an AAM Sandbox initiative in Thailand to accelerate eVTOL operations in Southeast Asia.

Archer Aviation acquired Lilium’s patent portfolio.

Boeing is preparing to increase production of its 737 MAX to 42 aircraft per month following the FAA’s decision to reinstate limited certification authority.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Adit is the founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy and business development consulting firm specialising in helping companies grow faster in aerospace, defence, and space sectors.

Get in touch with Adit via LinkedIn.

Welcome to Q4 2025.

Lots defence related activities in September. Let’s get started.

Europe’s Drone Wall

In early September, NATO fighter jets shoot down Russian drones violating Polish airspace. Later in the month, Copenhagen and other Danish airports and military sites saw drone incursions, prompting five-day civilian drone flights ban. Flights out of Munich airport cancelled due to drone sightings. NATO warships from Germany reported military drone sightings near Danish waters. These events have been attributed to potential Russian hybrid operations testing Europe’s airspace defences.

In response, the EU is fast-tracking a “Drone Wall” – a continent-wide system of sensors, electronic warfare tools, and autonomous interceptors. The initiative integrates AI-driven radar and optical detection, RF monitoring, jamming modules, and drone interceptors, aiming to provide continuous coverage along vulnerable frontiers.

The opportunity for businesses — startups and large primes alike — will be providing sensors and systems that can be easily integrated and supplied at scale. Fancy tech with AI-this and AI-that is great, but the key will be scalability and speed of the Drone Wall. This initiative should accelerate procurement and standardisation of counter-UAS solutions used within NATO and the EU.

In-Orbit Servicing: A Fundamental Tool for Militaries

Germany’s Defence Minister revealed that Russian satellites are shadowing German space assets. Later, the Head of UK Space Command mentioned that UK’s military satellites are being targeted by Russia on a weekly basis.

Germany also announced a €35Bn ($41Bn) investment in space capabilities over the next five years. It’s likely that other nations will announce similar plans. Space is now an integral part of a country’s defence strategies, along with drones, autonomous systems, and digital /cyber technologies.

In-Orbit Servicing and Manufacturing (ISAM) and Rendezvous and Proximity Operations (RPO) are slowly becoming the norm. What happened in September might just be the catalyst that accelerates the ISAM /RPO segment of the space sector.

Earlier in September, UK Space Command and US Space Command conducted their first joint military operation in space by performing an RPO to assess the status of the UK’s SKYNET 5A communications satellite.

While majority of Germany’s announced investment in space capabilities will likely focus on ISR, communications, and cybersecurity, orbital soft-kill, hard-kill, and in-orbit manipulation capabilities will become an increasingly important part of this.

The recent UK-US joint RPO to assess the status of the UK’s Skynet 5A comms satellite is a great example of this. The US and China have also been showing off their capabilities to monitor each other’s space assets.

In all of this, ISAM and RPO are emerging as fast-growing space market segments. Germany, Europe, and the world will increasingly invest in space defence, with space robotics and autonomy as key enablers.

Just as drones created a market for counter-drone interceptors, ground and space-based ASAT (anti-satellite) weapons and other hard-kill interception capabilities will become a big part of space defence.

Point—to—Point: Anywhere on Earth in under an hour

Hypersonics and re-entry physics have long been the domain of ICBMs and orbital vehicles, but now Earth-to-Earth space travel is seemingly gaining traction—driven largely by defence.

Some time ago, in reference to Starship, Musk has framed the concept as “anywhere on Earth in under an hour” using Starship. Blue Origin and Anduril Industries secured contracts to explore rapid rocket-based military cargo delivery. The goal: move supplies anywhere in the world faster than conventional transport, potentially reshaping logistics and battlefield readiness.

Companies developing advanced materials, reusable launch vehicles, in-orbit servicing, guidance systems, and rapid re-entry technologies stand to benefit long term. Keep an eye on this. Beyond defence, breakthroughs here could spin off into commercial cargo, emergency response, and even time-sensitive manufacturing.

What’s More:

Reports of Boeing exploring concepts for a next-generation narrow-body jet to replace the 737-MAX have been denied by Boeing, calling them “misleading”.

Beta Technologies has filed for an IPO on the NYSE to fund its electric aircraft and charging systems.

The EU pledged €6 billion to boost Ukraine’s domestic drone production capacity.

Boeing, Northrop Grumman, General Atomics and Anduril are all in line to produce conceptual designs for the Navy’s Collaborative Combat Aircraft program

In the UK, TEKEVER opens a new Swindon facility and Quantum Systems invests €50 million for UK expansion, the Royal Navy brings new logistics and ISR (Scheibel drones into service, and efforts to deploy British-made FPV “kamikaze” drones remain stalled by MoD procurement delays.

Looking eastwards, China is co-developing military UAVs with sanctioned Russian firm IEMZ Kupol, converting old J-6 fighters into supersonic drones, and unveiling new stealth designs like the “Type B” and a tailless unmanned fighter. Chinese eVTOL maker EHang is expanding China’s civil aerospace reach with the upcoming launch of its long-range VT35.

Out of India, ideaForge’s Q6 V2 UAV receives a NATO stock number, India accelerates its indigenous Tejas Mk1A fighter deliveries to replace aging MiG-21s, and moves forward with bids for its next-generation AMCA stealth fighter with seven firms competing.

Joby Aviation, Skyports, and RAKTA plan to launch an air taxi network in Ras Al Khaimah by 2027, and Joby demonstrates autonomous “SuperPilot” flights during a U.S. defense exercise.

In space, China and the U.S. are laying groundwork for low-Earth-orbit traffic control after a near-collision incident, while Avio secured a €40 million ESA contract to design a reusable upper stage. In Europe, investment firm Seraphim launched a Berlin subsidiary and Planet Labs plans major investment in a new satellite production site there. Meanwhile, SpaceX readies tests of its direct-to-device spectrum service and Musk says Starship will begin launching 100 tons to orbit next year.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Adit is the founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy business development consulting firm specialising in helping companies grow faster in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. Get in touch via LinkedIn if you need help growing faster.

Welcome to the August edition of the BLOS newsletter!

As we roll into September fall season, it’s back to work and back to school.

A quick note: if you’re at DSEI UK next week in London, drop me a message if you’d like to meet.

UK Defence: Simplicity and Scalability needed

In June 2025, the UK Government published its Strategic Defence Review report. Report talks about spending billions on nuclear weapons programs, autonomous systems, directed energy weapons, munitions, and more. It also intends to increase defence spending from 2.3% to 2.5% of GDP by 2027, and 3% of GDP by the next parliament.

A couple of weeks ago, British politician and ex-NATO chief George Robertson warned that the defence push will be ‘painful’ for the UK. Given the state of the UK’s sluggish economic growth, decreasing productivity and ongoing domestic issues, he’s right. Where is the funding going to come from?

It is also recognised that the UK MoD procurement processes need to be faster, UK primes need to work better with SMEs, and the country also needs to address the widening skills gap.

In addition to this, there’s another fundamental issue that doesn’t get talked about at roundtables and conferences: we give too much importance to R&D and developing fancy new tech. Yes, funding AI, quantum, and other new tech is needed. But funding simple, scalable systems and technologies that can be rapidly mass produced is more important.

Simple, scalable, mass produced systems provide cost-effectiveness and economies of scale upon which complexity (i.e. new technologies) can be implemented. To take an adversary’s example — since 2022, Russia has managed to lower the production cost of its Shahed drones from $370k to $70k. Russia is now starting to implement AI into these drones using smuggled Nvidia chips.

Simple and scalable first to enable economies of scale, then add the complexity of new technologies. This can also help address the widening skills gap in the country.

Here is some analysis based on a hypothetical exercise I published in Jan 2025:

Joby x Blade: A Signal of Adolescence?

Joby completed its acquisition of Blade Air Mobility’s passenger flight services business. While aircraft manufacturers don’t generally also operate aircraft, this is a nascent market segment. Joby, Archer, and a few others intend to operate their own aircraft as well as sell to selected parties. This will allow them to own the value chain as the market matures.

This isn’t new. In 1929, Boeing Aircraft Co merged with Pratt & Whitney to form United Aircraft and Transport Co. This was to control all facets of the aviation market — from engine and aircraft manufacturing to airline operations.

Interesting move from Joby, and a smart one, given Blade’s already established customer base in regions such as NY and South Europe. Once certified, this will provide Joby with a catalyst for growing its commercial operations, and revenues.

While Joby’s acquisition of Blade isn’t history repeating the same Boeing x Pratt & Whitney merger story word for word, it does rhyme. It is a sign of adolescence as the market matures.

Success of Starship IFT-10 and Megaconstellations

SpaceX successfully completed Starship’s IFT-10 (integrated flight test 10) and deployed mock Starlink satellites. Great news after a string of failures.

Falcon 9’s reusability has been a game changer for the space sector. SpaceX already has a ridiculously larger launch cadence (thanks partially to Starlink) compared to anyone else in the space sector. It is on track to complete 170 launches in 2025. Just last week, Falcon 9 also completed 30th flight using the same booster and completed 400th booster landing on drone ship.

One thing of note: megaconstellation operators like OneWeb of Kuiper aren’t just competing with Starlink, they are also competing with Starship development timelines and Falcon 9 launch cadence. Once Starship is operational, it will be able to carry 5-7x more Starlink satellites than Falcon 9, at a cheaper per unit cost, and able to replenish its constellation for peanuts (relatively speaking).

Starlink is already profitable, while its competitors are either making a loss (e.g. OneWeb as part of Eutelsat) or aren’t fully operational yet (e.g. Amazon Kuiper).

What’s More:

The UK’s NISTA has rated the Tempest/GCAP sixth-generation fighter programme “RED” due to its complexity and challenges. Measures are underway to address them and the project is not considered doomed.

Spain has decided against purchasing U.S.-made F-35 fighter jets and is now choosing between the European-made Eurofighter and the Future Combat Air System (FCAS).

India finalises design for its 5th gen fighter jet — Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA), and aiming for prototype rollout by 2027.

South Korea’s Navy Sea GHOST initiative will build drone aircraft carriers by the late 2030s, creating a fleet where manned and unmanned systems operate together using advanced UAVs for defence and attack.

Two relatively new Airbus A321neos leased to IndiGo are being scrapped because their parts, especially engines, are more valuable amid supply chain shortages and aircraft backlogs.

Following a similar U.S. policy, Taiwan will classify small drones as “consumables” to speed up procurement, boost local industry collaboration, and allow rapid deployment in future conflicts.

Pentagon’s Golden Dome will have a 4-layer defence system: a space-based sensing and targeting layer, three land-based layers, and a new large missile field in the Midwest. The system is estimated to cost 175 billion.

Rocket Lab has opened Launch Complex 3 in Virginia to support testing, launches, and recovery of its reusable Neutron rocket, which can carry 13,000kg to space.

From April 2026, UK Space Agency will be absorbed into the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Adit is the founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique commercial and strategy consulting firm specialising in helping companies grow faster in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. Get in touch via LinkedIn.

Lots has happened in the aerospace, defence, and space sectors in July. Lets focus on these three:

1. BAE half-year results

2. European CCAs (or the lack thereof)

3. Small European Launchers

BAE Systems’ Half-Year Results

Ignoring this badly photoshopped image of the GCAP 6th Gen Fighter Jet over Houses of Parliament, BAE Systems had a decent month — Türkiye and UK announced MOU to purchase 40 Typhoon jets, successfully completed a trial launching precision munitions from its Malloy T-150 UAS, and announced strong half-year results.

BAE Systems’ results boast big numbers — a 9% organic growth in sales, £75.4bn order backlog, and £180bn in pipeline (forecast) with a timeframe of 2035+.

Take forecasts like the 10+ year pipeline of £180bn with a handful of low-sodium salt, because the underlying assumptions aren’t visible. 10-years isn’t a long time in aerospace and defence, but for the thousands of SMEs and large suppliers that BAE Systems buys from in the UK and abroad, that number doesn’t mean much.

Instead, if you are part of the BAE Systems supply chain, align with the underlying trends that are visible — defence spending rising globally, militaries focusing on developing and procuring autonomous systems, AI, and cyber/EW.

Even though Typhoon production is almost grinding to a halt, Typhoon related developments, upgrades, and MRO related activities will likely grow to keep those aircraft flying. As an example, BAE Systems partnered with Avioniq to bring AI-driven live threat mapping to Typhoon.

European CCAs (or the lack thereof)

Small quadrotor drones and fixed-wing eVTOLs are quickly commoditising. CCAs are the “next big thing”. They are an integral part of the ‘system of systems’ philosophy that is starting to become the new norm for warfighters.

The US, with the YFQ-42A (General Atomics) and the YFQ-44A (Anduril) already in ground testing with maiden flights later this year and be operational by 2030.

Europe and UK don’t have many indigenous options. An updated Dassault nEUROn (first flew in 2012) was showcased at the Paris Air Show earlier this year, with a planned EIS in 2033 — a few years later than the US CCA platforms. BAE Systems unveiled two concepts in 2022. Nothing has been heard since.

Europe will be considering the US platforms. Partnerships have formed — Anduril x Rheinmetall offer Fury, Airbus D&S x Kratos offer Valkyrie, and Boeing looking for a European partner for Ghostbat. Italy is also considering the Turkish Kızılelma.

In the UK, the MOD has already introduced Tekever’s AR3 as Stormshroud Mk1 in operations as collaborative platforms to support F-35B Lightning and Typhoon, and have just launched tranche two of their ‘loyal wingman’ programme.

The point is — Europe is behind in developing CCAs, and the void will likely be filled by non-Europeans players through partnerships.

Small European Launchers

In early July, ESA selected 5 companies for its ’s European Launcher Challenge (ELC). ELC’s aim is to provide launch services to ESA between 2026 and 2030 and demonstrate upgraded launch capabilities. Each company will get up to €168mn.

The 5 companies selected are Isar Aerospace, MaiaSpace, Rocket Factory Augsburg, PLD Space, and Orbex.

ESA is trying to go with the funding model that has worked well for the US, and that’s great. European sovereign launch capability is essential. The challenge is, the funding still has to be approved by the member states of these companies’ location.

Additionally, developing launchers is expensive — to date, only 1 of 5 of these companies (Isar Aerospace) has raised more than €500mn. By comparison, Firefly Aerospace has raised $589mn.

That’s not to say funding is everything — Rocket Lab had only raised somewhere around $148mn to get to first flight.

Overall, relying on ESA and European customers as the main market is not a sustainable business model for European launch providers. Globally, the launch market is very competitive, and increasingly becoming more cost-competitive as launch becomes a ‘commodity’.

Initiatives like ESA’s ELC are great, but they are a few years too late.

What’s more:

New U.S.–EU trade agreement shields aircraft, engines and aerospace parts from newly imposed 15% tariffs on most EU goods, preserving a zero‑tariff regime essential to the aerospace supply chain.

Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth's "Unleashing U.S. Military Drone Dominance" directive aims to rapidly expand the Pentagon's drone arsenal through procurement overhauls, increased domestic production, and widespread integration into military training, with specific deadlines to achieve drone superiority by 2027.

China's AutoFlight CarryAll became the first two‑tonne eVTOL aircraft in the world to receive full airworthiness certification.

Joby Aviation is quietly testing a hydrogen‑powered autonomous UAV called the JAI 30, which flew for over nine hours during a test at Pendleton UAS Range — without public disclosure by Joby.

Regent launched a new military-focused division to build hybrid ground‑effect seaglider vehicles for the U.S. Marines, while China revealed photos of its own large four‑jet “Bohai Sea Monster” ekranoplan.

India’s probe into the June 12 Air India crash found both engine fuel switches were moved to “CUTOFF” after takeoff, causing engine failure, with no fault yet confirmed.

SES exceeded Q2 forecasts thanks to rising European defense spending, strong government deals including a €690M contract, and momentum from its Intelsat acquisition.

Australia’s first domestically built orbital rocket, the Eris by Gilmour Space Technologies, crashed just 14 seconds later in a planned data‑gathering test that left engines, systems, and launch infrastructure intact.

Gen. Michael Guetlein, newly confirmed to lead the Pentagon’s Golden Dome initiative, has been ordered to deliver a full architecture and implementation blueprint within 60 days, with the goal of a U.S. homeland missile defence system operational in about three years.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Adit is the founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy consulting firm specialising in helping companies grow faster in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. For contact, get in touch via LinkedIn.

Last week was the Paris Air Show.

With each passing year, the number of drone OEMs and drone component manufacturers have been increasing. The Paris Air Show was no different.

Here are 3 takeaways related to the drone industry from the Paris Air Show.

#1 More Autonomy, More AI

This is obvious. From spreadsheets to cars, everything is now AI-enabled, and companies that don’t leverage AI are not innovating. While that may be an exaggeration, it’s not far from the truth. More and more companies are marketing AI-enabled autonomy and swarm capabilities to AI-led engineering, manufacturing, and everything in between. Some of it is hot air, but a lot of it are starting to become genuine use cases with potentially game-changing results.

#2 More Internal Combustion

Drones have become an essential part of militaries and government agencies. When the general public think of drones, they think of a battery-powered multi-rotor (usually a quad-rotor) drone like a DJI. Some with some knowledge know of MQ-9s and the like. With proliferation of drones, there is a huge range and sizes of drones available, from quad-rotors to fighter-jet size drones. All of this means there is a persistent (and growing) need for turbofan, turboprop, and piston engines specific for drones. More suppliers are being seen marketing small internal combustion (IC) propulsion systems specifically developed for drones.

#3 More Composite Materials

As drones become more larger, faster, and more complex, the materials needs significantly change. As larger drones (class 2 and larger) proliferate, mass savings become paramount. 1 kg of mass saved in the airframe (or elsewhere) can be used for payload. Composites and advanced materials are now starting to play a larger role as drone systems become larger and faster. Several composite materials manufacturers are starting to play an important role in the sector.

Some pictures from the show:

The Headlines

Defence and Security

Ukraine has secured $43 billion this year to supercharge its domestic defence industry, and is rapidly developing domestic interceptor drones to shoot down Russian Shahed kamikaze swarms.

Airbus has completed assembly of its first SIRTAP tactical drone prototype in Getafe, Spain, and it’s now entering ground tests. A maiden flight expected by the end of 2025.

Airbus spinoff Aalto will fly its solar-powered Zephyr “pseudo-satellite” over the Mediterranean this summer to help France monitor and operate in the stratosphere as a new military domain.

AeroVironment’s ship-deployable JUMP 20 VTOL drone spent six months operating with the U.S. Navy’s 4th Fleet during Operation Southern Spear—providing fully autonomous, hands-free maritime surveillance.

General Atomics Aeronautical Systems is developing a new export‑compliant small UAS—dubbed “PELE” debuted at the 2025 Paris Air Show.

Invariant Corporation successfully conducted a live-fire, ship‑mounted demonstration of its STAKE surface-to-air system to intercept unmanned aerial targets from a moving naval vessel.

Bluelight

Louisiana has become the first U.S. state to empower local police—under the new “We Will Act” law—to intercept and disable drones posing credible threats near schools, events, or critical infrastructure using both kinetic and non-kinetic tools.

Commercial

Delair has launched the DT61—a heavy-lift, VTOL-capable fixed-wing drone with over seven hours of endurance, 100 km communication range, and a 15 kg payload.

Partnerships

France’s Ministry of Armed Forces and Airbus Helicopters (with Naval Group) have signed a framework agreement to equip French Navy frigates with the VSR700 UAS.

General Atomics is partnering with Saab to outfit its MQ‑9B drone family—including SkyGuardian, SeaGuardian, Protector, and a carrier-capable STOL variant—with Saab’s podded airborne early warning sensors.

Anduril Industries and Rheinmetall have teamed up to produce European versions of Anduril’s autonomous drones—Barracuda and Fury—and explore joint production of solid rocket motors.

Thales and Boreal have joined forces to develop a new long‑range loitering munition.

Quantum Systems and Airbus Defence & Space have teamed up (along with AI startup Spleenlab) under Germany’s KITU 2 research program to develop and trial AI-driven swarms of tactical eVTOL drones.

DroneSense and Parrot have partnered to deliver an ultra-secure, NDAA‑compliant “Blue UAS” drone solution.

Apian has partnered with Matternet to expand the NHS’s London-area drone delivery network.

Thales has partnered with Skydweller Aero to build a solar‑powered, Boeing 747‑size drone equipped with Thales’ AI‑powered AirMaster S radar capable of flying continuously for weeks or months.

Money Matters

Contracts

American Robotics: received a purchase order from a major U.S. urban public safety agency for its Kestrel counter‑UAS system (amount undisclosed).

Investment and M&A

Red Cat Holdings has raised $46.75 million through a direct stock offering to fund its newly launched maritime drone (Unmanned Surface Vessel) division.

AERIUM Analytics has acquired all assets of The Drone Bird Company (Clear Flight Solutions B.V.) to better serve aviation, agriculture, energy, and wildlife management sectors.

Recommended Reading this Week

Top 100 Drone Defense Companies in 2025

Le Bourget—A Subdued But Substantial Paris Air Show

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

This newsletter is authored by Adit Shah, founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy consulting firm specialising in helping companies accelerate and de-risk their growth in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. For contact, please get in touch via LinkedIn.

It’s been a busy week(end) preparing for the Paris Air Show, so today’s newsletter is vanilla. Just covering the news headlines. Enjoy, have a great week, and let me know if you’re around at the Paris Air Show.

The Headlines

Defence and Security

Russia launched a record 479 drones and 20 missiles, with Ukraine intercepting most and limiting damage. They have also deployed a new AI-powered “kamikaze” drone near Sumy, Ukraine, using Western tech parts despite sanctions.

France is discussing drone production with Renault to support Ukraine’s defence efforts against Russia.

Poland is becoming a key hub for Anduril’s AI-enabled combat drones to strengthen NATO’s defences.

Australian firm DroneShield is opening a European factory to boost local counter-drone tech amid rising demand.

Airbus Helicopters introduced HTeaming, allowing crews to control drones from helicopters to enhance missions.

The UK MOD’s Project VOLLEY aims to launch five drones quickly from vans, focusing on stealth and ease of use.

Quantum Systems opened a large US facility to accelerate AI-powered drone production for North and Latin America.

South Korea revealed a drone carrier that launches unmanned air, surface, and underwater vehicles.

Taiwan requested India’s D4 anti-drone system to counter growing drone threats from China using advanced tech.

Bluelight

European gangs increasingly use drones and trains to smuggle illegal cigarettes.

Commercial

China’s export controls have doubled drone component prices, pushing buyers worldwide to seek alternative supply chains.

Altitude Angel patented ARROW, a ground-based system enabling safer, cost-effective drone flights beyond visual line of sight.

Zipline received FAA approval to fly drones BVLOS nationwide, expanding its medical and retail delivery services.

Partnerships

Wingcopter partners with Ansys to improve drone design and increase flight range for medical deliveries.

UK firms Cambridge Pixel and OpenWorks developed a new AI-powered counter-drone system for police forces across Europe.

Leonardo and Baykar launched LBA Systems, a new UAV joint venture showcasing advanced drone tech at the Paris Air Show.

Money Matters

Contracts

General Atomics: signed the UK PASS contract with the UK MOD to support and maintain the RAF’s Protector RG Mk1 drones as they move into full operational use.

Skyways: secured a $37 million U.S. Air Force contract to mass-produce its V3 autonomous cargo drone, designed for long-range military and commercial logistics.

Aeronautics Ltd: secured $50+ million in contracts to supply its Orbiter 4 drones.

L3Harris: secured a US contract to provide VAMPIRE counter-drone systems that turn vehicles into rapid-defence units.

Investment and M&A

Unusual Machines is acquiring Rotor Lab in a $7 million deal to boost drone motor production with dual facilities in the U.S. and Australia.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

This newsletter is authored by Adit Shah, founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy consulting firm specialising in helping companies accelerate and de-risk their growth in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. For contact, please get in touch via LinkedIn.

Last week, the UK Government published its 2025 Strategy Defence Review (SDR) policy paper. It highlights why UK defence needs to transform in the increasingly volatile and uncertain world, the role of defence, how to fight, the allies and partners, and the capabilities with which it needs to fight.

The report makes 62 recommendations, all of which have been accepted by the government.

There is a clear (unsurprising) focus on uncrewed and autonomous systems and a recognition that they are redefining warfare.

Here are the key points from the SDR to pay attention to for the drone industry:

1. Shift towards greater use of autonomous systems and AI as an immediate priority for force transformation.

   1. “exploit the parallel development of a common digital foundation, a protected Defence AI Investment Fund, and an initial operating capability for a new Defence Uncrewed Systems Centre established by February 2026.”

   2. “Uncrewed and autonomous systems should be incorporated into the Integrated Force in high numbers over the next five years. They should be networked with crewed fifth- and sixth-generation assets as part of a ‘high-low’ mix of capabilities…“

2. Recognition of ‘Digital Integration' in developing a force dominated by AI, uncrewed, and autonomous systems. This means “Embracing open architectures and shared technical standards, from standardised drone hardware ports, to universal communications and AI protocols.“

3. Create an ‘Integrated Force Model’ that “is more lethal than the sum of its parts and skilled in warfare in different forms.”. This would be through the digital targeting web informed by lessons from Ukraine. Here is an illustration of the ‘digital targeting web’ part of the Integrated Force Model from the report:

4. NAVY: “…the Royal Navy should engage with commercial partners—including private finance—and other Governments to rapidly deliver an integrated frigate force for anti-submarine warfare, comprising crewed, uncrewed, and autonomous platforms.“

5. ARMY: “Autonomous and uncrewed (land and aerial) systems are now an essential component of land warfare, integrated with core armoured platforms in a dynamic ‘high-low’ mix of capability. A ‘20-40-40’ mix is likely to be necessary: 20% crewed platforms to control 40% ‘reusable’ platforms (such as drones that survive repeated missions), and 40% ‘consumables’ such as rockets, shells, missiles, and ‘one-way effector’ drones. Investment in attack and surveillance drones should be prioritised, along with counter-drone systems.“

6. AIR FORCE: “To assure the future of UK combat air, investment in autonomous collaborative platforms (ACPs) should be considered alongside investment in FCAS and the Global Combat Air Programme. The ACPs must be designed to operate in collaboration with the fourth-, fifth- and future generations of combat aircraft and to operate from the UK aircraft carriers.“

7. Multi-domain integration: Project ASGARD to enhance the Army’s ability to find and destroy enemy targets. “It will fully integrate surveillance capabilities (including cyber and space) with firepower (such as artillery, long-range missiles, aircraft, and single-use uncrewed aerial systems) via the digital targeting web.”

8. Protecting Critical National Infrastructure (CNI) onshore, offshore, and in space: while the report recognises a more substantive body of work needs to be carried out on CNI, it is obvious that counter drone systems will be part of that solution for onshore and offshore CNI protection. Novel Directed Energy Weapons (DEW) have also been mentioned as a key focus area long with ‘EW jammers’ as part of ‘CyberEM’ (Cyber and ElectroMagnetic) domain.

Recommended Reading section at the end of this newsletter has some good commentary on thoughts on the 2025 UK SDR from various experts.

The Headlines

Defence and Security

On June 1, Ukraine launched Operation "Spiderweb," deploying 117 AI-powered drones to strike five Russian airbases, destroying dozens of bombers and dealing an estimated $7 billion in damage.

Ukraine is forming new air defence units and expanding electronic warfare training to counter massive drone attacks, including a recent record-breaking assault involving 472 drones.

Ukraine’s new AI-powered “Sky Sentinel” turret is already proving effective by automatically spotting and shooting down Shahed drones. In recent tests, a single unit downed six drones and costs just $150,000.

The UK pledged £350 million to deliver 100,000 drones to Ukraine by 2026, alongside artillery support and troop training funds.

Latvia announced that Turkey and Belgium will join the 20-member Drone Coalition, which has pledged €2.75 billion in 2025 to support Ukraine with technology and joint procurement.

Russia has introduced a national drone curriculum for 8th and 9th graders, aiming to train one million operators by 2030 across more than 500 schools and 30 colleges.

Israel’s Iron Beam laser system became the world’s first operational high-energy laser weapon, effectively intercepting drones, rockets, and mortars in combat.

The Royal Navy successfully integrated a Puma drone with a crewed helicopter, marking a key advancement in hybrid maritime air operations.

France has deployed mobile micro-factories near the front lines to produce FPV drones on demand, boosting tactical flexibility and reducing supply chain reliance.

The U.S. Air Force has equipped F-15E jets with APKWS II rockets, enabling each aircraft to engage up to 50 drones per mission at significantly lower cost.

The UK announced a £5 billion investment in advanced drones and laser weapons, including plans to deploy the DragonFire laser on naval destroyers by 2027.

Bluelight

San Francisco is expanding citywide drone surveillance with a $9.4 million donation from Ripple’s co-founder.

Hong Kong police are using drones with loudspeakers and autonomous patrols to deter rural crime, raising questions about surveillance overreach.

Commercial

Walmart and Wing are expanding their drone delivery service to 100 stores in major U.S. cities, promising deliveries in under 19 minutes to millions of households.

Japanese researchers have developed a wireless energy beam that powers drones mid-flight without interfering with their onboard equipment, extending mission durations.

Portugal’s Marina de Lagos will become the first in the country to adopt Altitude Angel’s drone approval platform, enabling near-instant flight authorizations via Drone Assist and DroneSafetyMap.

Policy and Regulations

President Trump signed executive orders to fast-track U.S. drone innovation, strengthen airspace security, and reduce dependence on foreign technology. DJI has responded to these, expressing support for U.S. drone innovation and regulation improvements like Remote ID and BVLOS capabilities.

Congresswoman Elise Stefanik reintroduced the DFR Act, proposing tariffs on Chinese drones and funding for U.S.-made alternatives to secure critical infrastructure.

Partnerships

Nokia is leading an EU initiative with partners like Nvidia to develop autonomous drones and robots that protect vital infrastructure across land, sea, and air.

GE Aerospace and Kratos are partnering on affordable jet engines for next-gen unmanned aircraft.

Alpha Unmanned Systems and Airbus Helicopters España are teaming up to integrate tactical drones with manned missions.

Money Matters

Contracts

Terra Industries (Nigeria): won a $1.2 million deal to provide aerial security for two hydropower plants using autonomous drones and surveillance towers.

Xplorate (Australia): secured a contract (amount undisclosed) to inspect long-range gas pipelines using BVLOS drone operations, integrating AI to predict maintenance needs and extend infrastructure lifespan.

Vigilant Aerospace Systems (US): selected by the U.S. Air Force under the $46B EWAAC program to supply its FlightHorizon detect-and-avoid software for safer, autonomous drone operations.

SmartShooter (Israel): secured a $13 million U.S. Army contract to deliver AI-powered SMASH 2000L rifle-mounted systems for enhanced drone and ground threat targeting.

Picogrid (US): received a $1.1 million U.S. Army contract to deploy its Legion platform, which fuses data from legacy and modern military systems into battlefield tools like TAK.

General Atomics (US): won an $8.2 million U.S. Air Force contract to arm Spain’s MQ-9A Reaper drones under the Foreign Military Sales program, and a $34.9 million Navy contract to supply spare parts for MQ-9 Reapers and ground control stations, supporting U.S. Marine unmanned operations.

Investment and M&A

Drone detection startup Hidden Level raised $100 million to expand production of its passive radar tech, which detects both traditional and stealth drones for military and public safety use.

Recommended Reading this Week

Some thoughts on the UK 2025 Strategic Defence Review from elsewhere on the net:

Strategic Defence Review signals change, but without troops, nukes or funds, it's just words

The UK Strategic Defence Review lays out an ambitious roadmap for reform. Will the government deliver?

War plan or wish list – The UK Strategic Defence Review (audio podcast)

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

This newsletter is authored by Adit Shah, founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy consulting firm specialising in helping companies accelerate and de-risk their growth in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. For contact, please get in touch via LinkedIn.

Something different today than usual (because variety is the spice of life).

Capability (i.e. technology /innovation) development is often given too much importance. Don’t get me wrong — it is very important and should not be ignored. But it’s not everything.

Way too many drone industry start-ups focus on developing new technologies and features in the name of ‘innovation’, ‘cutting edge’, ‘disruption’, <insert clichés here>.

Design for scalability. Not just the product or technology, but the business too. How?

In my childhood friend Baloo’s words:

Look for the bare necessities
The simple bare necessities

Focus on the bare necessities.

Focus on being f**king good at 1-2 things that really matter (i.e. bare necessities) and build a simpler product, a simpler business. Simplicity is scalable — faster, better, cheaper.

Scaling up unlocks economies of scale. Economies of scale lowers costs and increases profits, which can be re-invested into building more capabilities without having to fully rely on life-support. Life-support is money from grants, seed, VCs, etc.

The goal of any start-up is (or should be) to get off life-support ASAP, or not need it in the first place (ideal but not always practical). Businesses that focus on the bare necessities can scale faster.

Scalability is a super power and a competitive advantage.

On a tangential note:

I wrote about cost vs capability of drones in warfare. Here’s the article if you haven’t read it yet:

From the defence point of view, scalability (and cost effectiveness) of drone production is key. Swarm sizes are increasing to near ridiculous numbers.

The Headlines

Defence and Security

Ukraine has deployed the AI-powered Sky Sentinel turret to automatically shoot down incoming drones, and a newly introduced Ukrainian handheld anti-drone pistol jams enemy drone signals up to 100 meters, improving frontline electronic warfare.

Russian operators are now controlling Shahed drones via Telegram bots and Ukrainian networks, making them harder to jam and more capable thanks to AI enhancements.

The Kremlin staged a fake drone attack on Putin’s helicopter to boost his wartime image, The Moscow Times found.

Russia has repurposed its Dan-M target drone into a fast, short-range strike UAV, and old Russian Yak-52 trainer planes are being converted into low-cost drone hunters.

Iran unveiled three new VTOL drones — Homa, Dideban, and Shahin-1 — for reconnaissance and kamikaze missions.

Türkiye successfully tested its jet-powered carrier drone, Bayraktar Kızılelma PT-4.

Canada’s Roshel introduced a counter-drone version of its Senator vehicle, using UK tech to protect against drone swarms and airborne threats.

India installed an anti-drone system at the Taj Mahal that detects threats up to 8 km away and blocks unauthorised drones near the monument.

Policy and Regulations

Donald Trump is planning executive orders to block Chinese drone makers like DJI from U.S. markets, citing national security risks and aiming to boost domestic drone production.

Partnerships

Flytrex and Wing launched a coordinated drone delivery system in Dallas, using shared flight paths to improve safety and scale future operations.

Aloft and UAS Sentry have teamed up to add real-time drone detection to public safety tools, streamlining airspace monitoring and threat response.

Money Matters

Contracts

NV5: a $10 million contract from North Carolina’s DOT to use drones and LiDAR for creating detailed 3D maps that will improve infrastructure planning.

QinetiQ US: a $41 million deal to boost the U.S. Army’s counter-drone systems with integrated sensors and tracking technologies.

SmartShooter: a $13 million U.S. Army contract to supply its AI-enabled SMASH rifle sights for precise targeting of drones and ground threats.

Elsight: a $9.63 million expanded deal with a European defence drone manufacturer to supply secure BVLOS communication tech for unmanned systems.

General Atomics: a $99.3 million U.S. Air Force contract to develop the GHOST, a hybrid-electric drone for surveillance and strike missions.

General Atomics is also in negotiations with Saudi Arabia to purchase up to 200 MQ-9 drones as part of a $142 billion defence package.

Investment and M&A

Motorola Solutions is acquiring Silvus Technologies for $4.4 billion to strengthen its secure wireless communications used in military and counter-drone operations.

Recommended Reading this Week

Allies are more than customers of America’s defense industrial base. They can help rebuild it.

Subscribe now

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

This newsletter is authored by Adit Shah, founder of Elantar, a UK-based boutique strategy consulting firm specialising in helping companies accelerate and de-risk their growth in aerospace, defence, and space sectors. For contact, please get in touch via LinkedIn.