As part of a deal with the US Department of Defense, a joint US-German company will provide Ukraine with some 33,000 AI-powered “strike kits’ that turn manually-operated drones intosutonimous computer-guided weapons.
The new deliveries come at a time when Russia has massively boosted its domestic production of Shahed-type drones, has launched increasing volumes of UAV strikes on Ukrainian civilian targets, and this is one more line of defense against them.
The kits are miniature Skynode computers, the company, Auterion, explained to the Financial Times. They are equipped with a camera and radio module that modify manually-operated UAVs, turning them into AI-powered weapons systems. The drones, so equipped, cannot be jammed and are capable of tracking moving targets up to half a mile away.
The $50 million contract with the Pentagon is part of an aid package from Washington that is separate from the “mega deal” announced by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday, which will see Washington purchasing between $10 billion and $30 billion worth of Ukrainian-made drones in exchange for Ukrainian purchases of American-made weapons.
Auterion said it will supply the kits before the end of the year. Its software is already used in Ukrainian drones deployed in combat, but this volume is “10 times in scale” of what it is presently, the company’s CEO, Lorenz Meier, told the FT.
“So we’ve shipped thousands and we’re now shipping tens of thousands,” he said. “It’s unprecedented.”
Meier said his company is a “pioneer” in US-Ukraine cooperation on joint drone production.
“[Ukraine has] a fantastic drone industry. What we want to contribute are things that they do not have already and that are more software-defined warfare-centric,” he said.
“It’s basically acknowledging that the battle-hardening that has happened in Ukraine of drone products is relevant. That it’s a way to support Ukraine, but it’s also technology that NATO countries want to get their hands on.”