The U.S. Army and the Defense Innovation Unit have selected eight companies to prototype autonomous software and processes to advance the use of uncrewed vehicles in challenging military operations as part of the Ground Vehicle Autonomous Pathways project. DIU said Wednesday the GVAP project seeks to provide a technical pipeline to support rapid modeling, development, testing and fielding of autonomous features.

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Constantine Saab, managing director and chief technology officer at Valor Equity Partners, has joined the advisory board of Peraton. Saab, an 18-year CIA veteran, will provide strategic counsel to Peraton's senior leadership team on shaping the company's business goals and objectives, the company said Thursday.

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The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has selected five companies to develop autonomous capabilities to enable military and commercial drones to carry out predefined operations without operator connection. DARPA said Thursday the Rapid Experimental Missionized Autonomy program is an 18-month, single-phase program that aims to develop drone autonomy adapter and mission-specific autonomy software.

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The U.S. Air Force has named the five companies selected to design and build a next-generation fleet of unmanned aerial vehicles meant to fly in coordination with crewed platforms. Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Anduril and General Atomics have been awarded contracts with undisclosed sums to continue rapid development for production for the Air Force's Collaborative Combat Aircraft program.

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Gecko Robotics, a developer of software and robotic technologies that work to build and maintain physical assets, announced raising $100 million from the extension of its Series C funding round in addition to the $73 million it had already received. Gecko Robotics said Tuesday that part of the Series C extension involves the expansion of its corporate board with the addition of U.S. Innovative Technology Managing Director Gaetano Crupi and Founders Fund Partner Trae Stephens.

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The Defense Innovation Unit has begun seeking proposals from industry sources capable of developing a hybrid architecture designed to integrate government and commercial networks to enable space-based communication capabilities. DIU said the second iteration of the Hybrid Space Architecture project will focus on four areas of interest: persistent sensing, resilient data transport, high-performance edge computing and data fusion.

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Thanatos is a drone developed by Kratos Defense and Security Solutions. This isn’t just any ordinary drone. Its name, derived from the Greek personification of death, hints at its formidable capabilities.    Thanatos has been on the radar of tech enthusiasts and defense analysts since 2019. This November, in 2023, the veil of secrecy was […] More

Robert W. Baird & Co. — the Milwaukee, Wisconsin-headquartered wealth management organization — is bringing a prestigious roster of government services company representatives and federal officials to the Ritz-Carlton, Tysons Corner on Nov. 15.

Wash100 Award winners Mile Corrigan of Noblis, Stephanie Mango of CGI Federal, Todd Probert of CACI and Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence Stacey Dixon will all be giving presentations.

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Scott Goldstein, a retired U.S. Air Force major general, has joined Parsons as a senior vice president, G2Xchange Defense reported Thursday. He brings to the Centreville, Virginia-based technology company his leadership and research and development experience in engineering, space, cybersecurity, electronic warfare and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance areas. Goldstein most recently served as chief scientist […] More

A group of 12 defense technology companies and venture capital firms provided the Department of Defense with four recommendations to reform acquisition, make revisions to specific planning, programming, budgeting and execution structures and address challenges to innovation. In a Friday letter to Defense Secretary and 2023 Wash100 awardee Lloyd Austin, the companies said they endorse […] More

The Department of Defense has begun to look toward Silicon Valley startups in its efforts to adopt advanced technologies to keep up with China’s widening military capabilities, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday. In the current defense landscape, the DOD relies heavily on its traditional partners, while China utilizes outside public-private guidance funds. DOD officials […] More

The Defense Innovation Unit has awarded other transaction contracts to Anduril Industries, Aalyria, Atlas and Enveil for a program that seeks to demonstrate a hybrid architecture that would allow government, military and commercial space assets to provide data communications worldwide. DIU said Thursday it is collaborating with the U.S. Space Force and the Air Force […] More