🔷 Saved Rounds 5.6.25

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

🌷 HEADS UP! Mother’s Day is this Sunday. You’re welcome.

📺 PODCAST: Check it out on YouTube or download the podcast on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your content.

Hellhound

Check out our latest episode, a conversation with Cummings Aerospace on their Hellhound 3D-printed jet-powered kamikaze drones.

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They Said It

“We still have a lot to learn to simply get to this thing airborne, flying, and executing next to an F-35, and not hitting each other. I know there’s a lot of work out there, but that’s important to make sure that we become lethal.”

— Col. Derek Brannon, director of the Marine Corps’ Cunningham Group, on the manned-unmanned teaming (MUM-T) experimentation campaign with the XQ-58

Word of the Week

APFIT: Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies (APFIT) is a program run by the Pentagon’s Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) to help selected technologies from small and non-traditional companies cross the ‘valley of death’ and get into production. Awards range from $10M to $50M.

Why it Matters: The FY2026 cycle starts this month. May 8th is the first virtual office hours; here’s how to sign up.

 ICYMI

You asked for patches—we listened.

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Tweet of the Week

Saved Rounds

• TSC (with AEVEX & Pipistrel) revealed a new Group 4 ISR platform that can fly for 3+ days

• AEVEX’s Atlas drone was selected for the Army’s Launched Effects-Short Range (LE-SR) demo

• Astrotech secured a $77.5M contract to accelerate pre-launch satellite processing

• Airbus will buy parts of Spirit AeroSystems’ US and UK assets so they do not go to Boeing

• Northrop Grumman is planning to make its Integrated Battle Command System (IBCS) accessible to soldiers through a mobile app

• The Netherlands was approved to buy $2.2B in Tomahawk cruise missiles

• Spire Global completed the $241M sale of its space-based maritime tracking business to Belgian analytics provider Kpler

• Piasecki acquired Kaman Air Vehicles’ KARGO program (cargo drones competing for a Marine Corps program)

• Epirus delivered a new counter drone microwave weapon prototype to the Marine Corps

• Norway F-35s received their first Joint Strike Missile (JSM) from Kongsberg

• Apex raised a $200M Series C round to boost satellite production

• The Army plans to boost GMLRS rocket production to 9,000 per year

• Anduril introduced a compact Pulsar EW variant

• DZYNE launched a new variant of its Dronebuster handheld counter-drone system

• The Italian Army received its first UH-169D helicopter

• Poland was approved to buy $1.3B in AIM-120D missiles

• SiFly exited stealth mode and unveiled 2 new quadcopter products (4X endurance, 10X range vs current market)

• India’s DRDL latest scramjet test surpassed 1,000 seconds

• Northrop Grumman unveiled Lumberjack, a jet-powered loitering munition that dispenses Hatchet precision bomblets

• Dark is building an air-launched satellite grabber

• Mercury acquired Star Lab to boost secure processing

• AeroVironment completed its BlueHalo acquisition

• Radian Aerospace revealed its reentry vehicle

• The Marine Corps is considering modular mission payloads for its new CH-53K helo

• The Space Force selected 12 companies for its 10-year, $237M small satellite contract

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