🔷 Saved Rounds! 2.20.24

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

📺PODCAST: Check it out on YouTube or download the podcast on Spotify, Apple, Pandora, iHeartRadio, etc.

🎧 LOWDOWN: Something new for ‘24 we’re trying: we just dropped a short audio-only episode that summarizes the intel crammed in our weekly newsletters. We may keep it—or kill it—depending on feedback. Check it out using the links above.

They Said It
“This will be part of the reinvention of our Air Force and airpower into the future.”

— Gen. David Allvin, Chief of Staff of the Air Force, on the role drones and human-machine teaming will play in the transformation of the Air Force

Zoom in

If you’re reading this, you know you can’t mention China without Taiwan. But what’s maintaining the peace, and why is it rapidly eroding?

Zoom in here to understand more about the deterrence gap in the Taiwan Strait.

In that Number

20 of 31

Around 20 of 31 NATO countries are set to hit the 2% GDP defense spending target in 2024. Last year, only 11 countries hit the mark. As NATO slowly moves toward the 2% goal, expect to see more defense tech opportunities across Europe.

Saved Rounds

•  Varda finally received a reentry license for its space drug-manufacturing capsule (see podcast episode 15)

• Pratt & Whitney’s XA103 adaptive engine passed critical design review for Air Force’s 6th gen NGAD fighter program

• BAE was cleared to acquire Ball Aerospace for $5.5B

• The Air Force will start fielding MH-139 Grey Wolf helicopters next month

• The Air Force is looking at a variety of potential offsets to cover the $35B overrun on the Sentinel ICBM

• SpaceX plans to deorbit 100 older Starlink satellites—they still have 5,400+ in orbit

• Albers Aerospace acquired Onepath Systems

• Rebellion Defense was selected to supply software for Project Overmatch, the Navy’s effort to support CJADC2 (Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control)

• LeoLabs raised $29m to advance it’s object tracking and on-orbit maneuver detection capabilities for space situational awareness

• UK defense spending hit a record $31.5B last year

• Azerbaijan revealed it now has a Bayraktar Akıncı twin-prop ISR/strike drone

• Red 6 integrated its AR helmet into Lockheed Martin’s TF-50 simulator

• BlueHalo is acquiring defense Tech company Eqlipse Technologies

• Indonesia cancelled a deal to buy 12 retired Mirage 2000-5 fighters from Qatar due to budget constraints

• Sigma Defense Systems acquired Juno Technologies to expand their data analytics for defense

• Aalyria demoed a software platform to manage a hybrid mesh network of communications satellites

• The Marine Corps is testing a semi-submersible missile-delivery drone boat modeled after drug smuggler boats

• Hungary’s first C-390 Millennium military transport aircraft has flown

• Virtualitics (AI startup) wants to adapt its equipment predictive maintenance tech for an AI tool to flag risks in projects and programs

• The Air Force is testing prototype mobile C2 tech that can fuse data across 800 different feeds

• BAE was selected by Boeing to upgrade the computer on the Navy’s MQ-25 Stingray aerial refueling drone

• The Air Force awarded BAE a contract to provide the mission system for the last 4 of the 10 EA-37B Compass Call jets

• The Pentagon selected 4 tech programs for APFIT funding (Accelerate the Procurement and Fielding of Innovative Technologies)

• The Space Force canceled a $2B+ classified communication satellite program due to costs and delays

• Italy is buying Small Diameter Bomb Increment IIs (SDB-II)

and finally…

• Do NOT touch America’s boats 

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