Best of LinkedIn: Defense Tech CW 20/ 21

00:00:00: provided by Thomas Allgaier and Frennus.

00:00:02: Based on the most relevant posts on LinkedIn about defense tech in CW TwentyandTwentyOne, Frenness is a B-to-B market research company that supports ICT providers with a structured defense market entry framework designed to move them from European Defense Opportunity Landscape to qualified ministry conversations.

00:00:19: within six to eight weeks you can find more info.

00:00:23: So welcome to the deep dive.

00:00:24: We are completely skipping The Fluff today and just getting straight into the realities of modern defense technology, right?

00:00:31: Because we really want a breakdown what these massive shifts actually mean for you.

00:00:34: Yeah, exactly.

00:00:35: And the overarching mission for today's deep dive is really to unpack this fundamental transformation that just sweeping through the entire defense tech industry.

00:00:43: We've got an incredible stack of curated LinkedIn insights tracking the realities of calendar weeks twenty and twenty one.

00:00:50: So we're gonna explore things like the brutal new economics of autonomous swarms The boom in startup funding How AIs actively rewiring military command layer.

00:01:00: Okay, let's unpack this because I want to start with an analogy.

00:01:02: To kind of set the stage for you.

00:01:04: imagine trying to fight off a swarm Of like a thousand angry hornets But your only weapon is a solid gold tennis racket.

00:01:13: that sounds very expensive

00:01:14: right?

00:01:15: You might swat if you out-of-the-air sure but eventually you're gonna go completely bankrupt before you run out of Hornets.

00:01:20: and That Is The modern battlefield Right now was looking at his post from beat bends And he shared a staggeringly scary statistic The capability to deploy a thousand one-way attack drones, so OWA drones in a single twenty four hour window.

00:01:35: That's not some theoretical war game concept anymore.

00:01:38: It is verified reality.

00:01:40: Yeah.

00:01:40: and the math behind that reality it just brutal.

00:01:43: you literally cannot fire A two million dollar Patriot service air missile at ten thousand dollars piece of flying plastic and expect to win a war of attrition.

00:01:51: Traditional Western doctrine relies on these incredibly sophisticated, super precise but immensely expensive interception systems so that economic asymmetry is forcing the total ground up.

00:02:02: rethink how aerospace innovation even works.

00:02:05: Exactly!

00:02:05: And from what I'm seeing across those sources... The solutions aren't just crawling out of massive traditional defense crimes anymore.

00:02:13: The innovation is highly decentralized.

00:02:15: Like, Chaco Manizlanca highlighted this really fascinating post about a small, highly specialized engineering team that just built a battery-powered drone capable of hitting Mach .six.

00:02:26: Right

00:02:26: which is what?

00:02:27: Roughly four hundred and fifty miles per hour?

00:02:30: Yeah around there!

00:02:30: Pushing a battery-powered system to that speed means you have to overcome intense thermal constraints.

00:02:36: Batteries overheat incredibly fast under the kind of load, usually if your going solve those material science problems and need multi billion dollar R&D finality for tier one lab.

00:02:46: The fact that small agile team pulled this off really shows how rapid prototyping is democratizing high end capability?

00:02:53: Oh, absolutely.

00:02:54: But it's not even just about raw speed.

00:02:56: sometimes It's just about you know simple low-cost ingenuity to extend your reach.

00:03:01: Louis Salons pointed out a system from Kettle Tech Labs and it's called the Hornet.

00:03:05: That's a fixed wing drone but instead of launching it from a runway or like a pneumatic catapult They actually carry it up to high altitude using a standard weather balloon.

00:03:15: oh wow so they Just floated up there.

00:03:17: yeah

00:03:17: just floats up and then automatically releases.

00:03:20: And because it starts so high, It glides in with its battery still fully charged.

00:03:25: That is I mean that's brilliant asymmetry right there.

00:03:28: By launching from a balloon, they drastically extend the strike range without needing heavier batteries.

00:03:33: And the other thing is balloons have virtually zero radar signature.

00:03:37: Right because it's just latex or whatever.

00:03:39: Exactly!

00:03:40: A Defender early warning system usually looking for thermal bloom of rocket launch Or the radar cross section incoming jet right?

00:03:48: They are definitely not looking for silent unpowered weather balloon that's casually drifting up to altitude before dropping a strike package

00:03:56: which creates a completely terrifying scenario for the defender on the ground.

00:04:01: I mean, you have a threat that is cheap arriving potentially by the thousands and it's practically invisible until the last few seconds.

00:04:08: so

00:04:08: how do you actually defend against that without bankrupting yourself?

00:04:12: Well the counter UAS...the counter drone response is evolving at just a blistering pace.

00:04:16: to meet William Sheehy and Paul Zakowski actually shared a major update on the AMPV- Thirty drone killer vehicles.

00:04:24: The defense industry moved from identifying this battlefield threat to having actual soldiers training on these new vehicles in just ten months, which

00:04:33: in military procurement time is basically light speed.

00:04:35: it's

00:04:35: unheard of.

00:04:36: yeah

00:04:36: let's break down what the mbv-thirty does so you get a clear picture.

00:04:40: Yeah This is an armored multi purpose vehicle with a thirty millimeter cannon but its not shooting standard bullets.

00:04:47: It uses programmable airburst munitions.

00:04:50: Which is the real game changer here?

00:04:51: Exactly!

00:04:52: Instead of trying to score a direct hit on tiny drone zipping around at one hundred miles an hour, The vehicle calculates distance and programs it's round to explode just in front of the drone swarm.

00:05:04: It basically creates this massive wall Of physical shrapnel In mid-air...it shreds the swarm out of sky.

00:05:12: Yeah, Physical defense is definitely crucial But building thousands of armored vehicles still takes time.

00:05:18: The digital defense layer is where we're seeing the truly scalable stuff, like Matt McCran pointed out a massive step forward.

00:05:24: with tactical radios companies are integrating counter drone tech directly into the widely deployed comms equipment that soldiers already carry, and they're doing it purely via software upgrades.

00:05:35: Oh so there using software to find radios?

00:05:37: Exactly!

00:05:37: You just push a software update kind of like updating an app on your smartphone And suddenly as standard communication radio becomes a drone detection node.

00:05:45: you are blanketing in operational area with localized defense grid and didn't have to manufacture ship or deploy single piece new heavy hardware.

00:05:53: That's incredible.

00:05:54: But even all those sensor data There is limit

00:05:57: Right And that brings up the ultimate bottleneck.

00:05:59: It isn't hardware or software.

00:06:02: Laura S., from Scenario Insights, dropped a really vital piece of analysis on this.

00:06:07: She argues counter-UAS is no longer just hardwares.

00:06:11: it's fundamentally decision chain problem.

00:06:14: Let us pause there.

00:06:15: What exactly does a Decision Chain Problem mean for you if your commander are in ground?

00:06:20: So If a swarm of low cost drones comes at your base The adversary's main goal might not actually be to blow up a specific building.

00:06:43: but you have fifty different GPS systems, shot in conflicting directions at your triple speed.

00:06:48: Yes!

00:06:49: Your brain just shuts down.

00:06:51: It's essentially a localized cognitive DDoS attack.

00:06:54: That is the perfect analogy And Laura calls the necessary response to this adaptive continuity, meaning you have to build systems that actively protect human judgment.

00:07:04: You have to preserve conventional offline fallback methods for when digital signals inevitably get jammed or when screens go dark.

00:07:19: and commanders are cracking under that data pressure, it completely makes sense why the military is rushing to use artificial intelligence.

00:07:27: Yeah, AI is rapidly becoming the critical infrastructure layer to manage that exact overload.

00:07:33: Preston Feinberg highlighted how deeply Palantir is embedding itself as a core operational brain.

00:07:39: I mean, Palantire CEO Alex Karp has been cooperating really intimately with Ukraine and one incredible result of this is the Bray-V won data room.

00:07:47: Right right about it!

00:07:48: This platform where over hundred different defense companies are actively training more than eighty different models using real live battlefield data.

00:07:58: Yeah, they're training algorithms to detect classify and intercept targets in the most complex noisy combat conditions imaginable.

00:08:06: having access to unfiltered chaotic real-world Data is really The only way you can build an AI that won't just panic when it sees something unexpected outside of lab.

00:08:15: Okay But I have to push back here for a second because relying so heavily on one company raises a massive strategic red flag.

00:08:23: I was reading Luca Leone's post about NATO.

00:08:25: NATO apparently just adopted Palantir's Maven smart system in about six months, largely because there were no other viable alternative ready to deploy at scale.

00:08:52: Felix Roken posted about Helsing, which is a European defense tech company.

00:08:57: They are hiring aggressively right now to build out an AI-first software defined air defense architecture just to ensure there are viable alternatives in the

00:09:07: ecosystem.".

00:09:09: And it seems like the massive traditional primes are pivoting to this Software First mindset as well.

00:09:15: Jim Teichelit and Paul Lemmo from Lockheed Martin have been super vocal about pushing for open architectures.

00:09:20: They know the future isn't a lockdown proprietary system where you can only buy upgrades from one vendor.

00:09:25: In fact, Shelby Hritz highlighted their rollout of the Santham AI Counter Drone System.

00:09:30: Sanctum is actually a perfect example of federated learning in defense.

00:09:34: It's an AI-driven mission management system that learns in real time, so if a sanctum node operating in say jungle environment recognizes brand new evasive maneuver from enemy drone it updates the broader network.

00:09:48: every other note around globe instantly downloads behavior profile and gets smarter.

00:09:53: But wait, for the listener who maybe isn't a network engineer.

00:09:55: All of this incredible AI and federated learning requires a super reliable internet connection right?

00:10:02: If your central command base gets jammed by electronic warfare.

00:10:06: all that sophisticated AI is basically a brick.

00:10:11: That's exactly what Vernon Weisenbergs update on The Voyager Gateway One addresses.

00:10:15: This system is pushing regatedge computing & lattice mesh networking straight to the frontline warfighter.

00:10:21: Let's explain that mesh networking concept real quick.

00:10:24: In a traditional network, everything routes back to a central hub like a router.

00:10:27: if the enemy blows up the router The whole Network goes dark.

00:10:30: but in a Mesh network every single radio or node acts as its own mini-router.

00:10:34: so If one goes down the network automatically just reroutes the data around it through those surviving nodes

00:10:40: Exactly!

00:10:41: So bringing that server level compute power out of the safe air conditioned base and putting into waterproof box in the mud, it means small teams can maintain their AI workflows autonomously.

00:10:54: The edge of the battlefield becomes intelligent even if it gets severed from.

00:11:08: You cannot download an interceptor missile.

00:11:10: Very true.

00:11:11: Software is completely useless if you don't have the physical metal to carry it into the sky.

00:11:16: and right now The traditional defense giants simply can not bend metal fast enough To keep up which is opening the floodgates for a totally new industrial approach.

00:11:24: Yeah, but procurement bottleneck is arguably the most severe threat to Western Defense readiness Right Now.

00:11:30: Richard Gilliam issued a really stark warning to the Royal Navy and the broader UK ecosystem.

00:11:36: He pointed out that you simply cannot build adaptable mass with slow-moving monopolies.

00:11:41: If you wait fifteen years for perfect platform to crawl through traditional pipeline, The threat landscape has already changed three times over.

00:11:48: You've lost before even deploying

00:11:51: And the adversaries are definitely not waiting fifteen years.

00:11:54: Mark Siel added a brilliant perspective on this.

00:11:56: He noted that Ukraine didn't just invent new drone technology, they completely reinvented how capability is built in the first place.

00:12:03: Treating production itself as a capability?

00:12:05: Yes

00:12:06: it's highly distributed its iterative.

00:12:08: They are literally modifying hardware designs based on what happened at a trench yesterday afternoon

00:12:13: and The venture capital world has definitely noticed this shift.

00:12:17: Nazarev Rechenik pointed out that defense-as-a-service Is now a premium VC category.

00:12:21: Startups that are moving fast and breaking things in the defense space, our pulling massive multiples right now.

00:12:27: But Victor Demetrenko highlighted the dangerous flip side to this gold rush.

00:12:32: last year nearly fifty billion dollars flowed into Defense Tech And The result is a massive messaging crisis.

00:12:39: He called it a sameness crisis, right?

00:12:41: Because every new startup pitching to the Ministry of Defense sounds exactly the same.

00:12:45: They all claim to have a dual use AI powered autonomous drone solution.

00:12:49: if you're our procurement officer.

00:12:50: It's just a sea of white noise.

00:12:53: How does the company actually cut through that?

00:12:55: well Daria Bordabachek provided the clearest answer to that physical real-world validation from frontline operators.

00:13:01: She was at a deep tech event in Berlin watching these companies pitch space lasers and Autonomous Tech.

00:13:06: And her fundamental question Who validated this with the person whose life actually depends on it?

00:13:12: She pointed to companies like Highghcat and Sintessa AI as a gold standard for this.

00:13:17: Sintesa is really great example of solving real problem instead just building cool tech.

00:13:22: They realized that while millions of FPV first-person view drones are being manufactured, A huge percentage of them sit unused in warehouses

00:13:31: Because there aren't enough pilots.

00:13:33: Exactly!

00:13:34: Flying an FPV drone manually under combat stress Is incredibly difficult.

00:13:38: So Cintessa isn't just building another generic drone, they are building autonomy software backwards specifically to solve the operator shortage.

00:13:47: They automate the flight path so a minimally trained soldier can actually use it effectively.

00:13:51: Identifying and solving the actual friction point is what matters.

00:13:55: an Aaron Block at Metaprop offered another critical reality check regarding those friction points.

00:14:00: he stated very bluntly you can't manufacture autonomous submarines in a wee work.

00:14:05: I love that quote.

00:14:06: We get so caught up in venture capital pitch decks and shiny software interfaces, we completely forget about the concrete.

00:14:12: Right All of this advanced tech requires massive, unsexy physical infrastructure.

00:14:18: We are talking about pouring concrete for warehouses navigating zoning permits securing heavy labor tapping into massive industrial power grids.

00:14:27: If your software advantage is light speed but it takes you thirty months to build a factory that should take fourteen Your software advantage means nothing.

00:14:34: The physical world is the ultimate bottleneck.

00:14:37: But once that physical production finally scales up It doesn't just stay in the air where you're seeing this new industrial output bleed aggressively into every single operational domain.

00:14:48: Like, let's look at what is happening over the water.

00:14:50: Matt Ozzer shared a post about Helsing's HX-II midrange strike drone having its first successful launch from small coastal vessel.

00:14:57: The implications of that for naval doctrine are massive.

00:15:00: Historically if wanted to project air power over ocean You needed multi billion dollar aircraft carrier with thousands of sailors and whole flotilla support ships.

00:15:10: now You have significant maritime strike capabilities being executed by autonomous drones launched off the back of cheap, highly mobile inflatable boats.

00:15:20: It radically shifts the balance of naval

00:15:22: power.".

00:15:23: And it's happening in the air in ways we didn't anticipate either.

00:15:26: Aviv Barzohar reported that Ukrainian FPV UAVs are now actively launching rockets while on flight.

00:15:33: Just think about the physics of that for a second.

00:15:35: It's insane!

00:15:35: The recoil of firing a kinetic weapon from a lightweight hovering plastic drone usually destabilizes it completely, and the fact they have engineered around this means these drones are transitioning to being simple one-way kamikaze explosives into reusable flexible aerial weapons platforms

00:15:51: And...the expansion onto land is equally aggressive.

00:15:54: George Huckle and Dr.

00:15:56: Jonas Singer were discussing ARX Robotics.

00:15:59: This is a European company founded by ex-military officers, And they aren't spending years running theoretical lab tests.

00:16:06: They are putting their Gerion unmanned ground vehicle which Is a rugged robotic land drone for transport and casualty evacuation Straight into the hands of real soldiers For immediate field application Gathering that instant feedback from the end user bridges gap between an engineering prototype and a trusted battlefield necessity.

00:16:24: But the domain that really bends the mind and obviously fundamentally alters a concept of national borders is space.

00:16:30: We used to think if space was just quiet place where we parked GPS satellites, right?

00:16:34: Now it's center gravity for global conflict.

00:16:37: Michael Hedges Theodosia made fascinating point about low Earth orbit or Leo satellite constellations.

00:16:43: Yeah he specifically pointed Starlink impact in Venezuela as prime example.

00:16:47: reshaping information sovereignty.

00:16:49: Exactly how does bypass sovereignty though?

00:16:52: Like,

00:16:53: if a nation controls its borders and it's telecommunications infrastructure how does the satellite network circumvent that?

00:17:00: Well traditional telecommunications require physical cell towers and fiber optic cables that route through central switches which are controlled by national government.

00:17:09: A government can simply flip a switch and turn off the internet during crisis.

00:17:14: But, private alio constellation beams broadband Internet directly from space to small receiver dish on ground.

00:17:21: Oh I see!

00:17:21: Yeah so a private company could provide uncensored communication for citizens or soldiers in a crisis zone completely bypassing physical infrastructure and legal regulations of that sovereign nation.

00:17:32: It effectively removes governments monopoly information within its own borders.

00:17:37: That is a profound shift in geopolitical power.

00:18:07: It's incredible to trace this thread.

00:18:09: From Alexander Soroka talking about Taloka building next-generation underwater drones, all the way up to private satellite networks.

00:18:18: redefining The narrative is exactly the same.

00:18:22: The speed of software development is fundamentally redefining the physical limits of hardware.

00:18:26: Absolutely!

00:18:27: The integration of advanced sensors, autonomous shooters and AI-driven decision systems across the sea land air And space domains Is creating an environment with zero margin for error... ...the side that learns iterates and adapts its system to fastest is the side that survives.

00:18:42: Which brings me a final thought I want leave you today.

00:18:46: We spend an enormous amount of time obsessing over the top speed on these new hypersonic drones, processing power for the latest AI models and payload capacity in autonomous systems.

00:18:58: But as we comb through all this insights it becomes pretty clear that perhaps the ultimate weapon is not a piece of physical technology at all.

00:19:07: It's the speed of an organization procurement cycle And its institutional ability to unlearn old habits.

00:19:14: If your adversary can iterate a drone design and push it to the front line in three weeks, And you're internal bureaucratic paperwork takes three years just to approve purchase order.

00:19:24: Does that really matter how good your technology is?

00:19:26: That's The Real Battlefield right there!

00:19:28: Well thank-you so much for joining us on this deep dive.

00:19:31: Make sure you hit subscribe So don't miss next one.

00:19:33: Stay curious.

00:19:34: We'll see ya next time.

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