🔷 Saved Rounds! 3.26.24

Welcome to Tuesday's Saved Rounds, where we send out all the goodies we couldn't squeeze into our Sunday newsletter.

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They Said It
“Committing to one, as good as that company might be, would perhaps foreclose other options because there’s so much innovation with new companies in that space.”

— Assistant Secretary of the Army Doug Bush, on the service’s hesitation to commit to buying large amounts of drones from any company because the technology is maturing too fast. We’ve got the perfect meme for this situation.

Zoom in

Space-based communication is one of the fastest-growing tech sectors out there. While SpaceX’s Starlink gets most of the attention, some business movements amongst the rest of the sector have promising military applications.

Zoom in here to learn more about how commercial firms are partnering to create multi-orbit hybrid networks for the military.

In that Number

75

The US Navy requested $16.6B to procure 75 aircraft—13 F-35B, 13 F-35C, 3 MQ-25, 19 CH-53Ks, and 27 T-54 multi-engine trainers.

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Saved Rounds

• The Pentagon plans to spend $1B in 2024 and 2025 on its Replicator mass drone effort

• Boeing secured a $1.1B deal with the Navy that will keep the F/A-18 Super Hornet line open until 2027

• Sweden contracted Saab and GKN to start charting out a next-gen fighter program

• Northrop Grumman is producing digital radar warning receivers for Army aviation

• Poland took delivery of its first Saab 340 Erieye AEW&C (Airborne Early Warning and Control) aircraft

• Boeing’s revamped KC-46A remote vision system (RVS 2.0) is delayed again to 2026 (2 years behind schedule, 7 years after the first KC-46 tanker was delivered to the Air Force)

• Firestorm Labs announced it raised a $12.5m seed funding round led by Lockheed Martin Ventures

• Sierra Space is developing dual-use spacecraft with military potential

• Japan plans to export its next-gen F-X fighter

• Anduril tested a variant of its larger in-development ALTIUS-700 loitering munition with a warhead

• Poland was approved to buy a whopping $3.7B in missiles (700+ AIM-120, 230+ AIM-9X, and 800+ JASSM-ER stealth cruise missiles)

• Taiwan is buying 4 more MQ-9B drones, bringing its total to 8

• Taiwan is reportedly looking to buy 200 armed sea drones to deter (or counter) a Chinese invasion [they should add a zero and buy 2,000 just to be sure]

• Reliable Robotics was selected for Air Force’s TACFI program to advance its aircraft autonomy

• Ursa Major’s hypersonic rocket engine flew for the first time

• Lockheed’s extended-range GMLRS doubled the range of existing HIMARS missiles in its latest trial

• Umbra released a badass bistatic SAR image from its tandem pair of radar satellites

• Saab's bid to sell Gripen E fighters to Thailand received backing from the UK

• India approved the prototype development of its 5th-gen AMCA fighter

• The Army’s Precision Strike Missile Increment 2 (PrSM Inc 2) is delayed over developmental issues with the anti-ship multimode seeker

• Switzerland cut the scope of its F/A-18C/D Hornet upgrades and slipped the completion date to 2027 (as the first F-35As start showing up) 

• SOCOM is reducing its OA-1K Armed Overwatch buy from 75 to 62 aircraft

• Brunei’s defense budget surged by 32% as it focused on increased threats from China in the South China Sea

• The Air Force conducted the last test shot of the canceled AGM-183A ARRW hypersonic missile

• South Korea’s KF-21 fighter started aerial refueling testing

• The Space Force wants $248M to rapidly develop and field a new jam-resistant SATCOM constellation (Ka-band and X-band)

• Aireon is leading a coalition to create space-based VHF communication services (most current comms are UHF and above)

• Kongsberg is investing $60m to expand production of Naval Strike Missiles (NSM)

• SpaceX’s Starship mega-rocket is still in the test stages but already has ideas for defense applications

• SpaceX is building a network of 100s of spy satellites for US intelligence under a $1.8B contract

• NATO’s DIANA defense tech accelerator is doubling its footprint after showing initial progress

• Boeing is looking to sell Digital Receiver Technology, a small defense surveillance business it acquired in 2008

• The Air Force scrapped plans to put a laser weapon on the AC-130J gunship

• The Air Force is certifying the F-117 to aerial refuel from KC-46 tankers

• Fleet Space Technologies demoed satellite-enabled push-to-talk (PTT) comms for the Australian military

• The Space Development Agency will begin demoing space-to-ground Link 16 this year

• The Pentagon’s missile-emulating Mach 2.5+ target drone completed its maiden Flight

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