Shield AI sells 292 V-BAT drones to Taiwan, Hadrian signs seven year Lockheed Martin deal, and more - Defense AI Brief #62

Over the past two years AI Brief has grown into a website, 19 LinkedIn pages with more than 81,000 followers and 15 newsletters with more than 41,000 subscribers, Defense AI Brief among them. Thank you for reading, following and passing it on.

Until now, our newsletters were assembled automatically: the news assigned to each newsletter went into a simple template. From this edition, our small team, Maiko, Rene and Stefan, edits every edition so it reads as one storyline: related news together, the important stories explained, the rest kept short. We still use AI tooling throughout, and we decide what goes in and how it is told.

In this edition, covering 12 to 18 October:

• Taiwan's navy and coast guard are acquiring 292 Shield AI V-BAT drones, 280 of them under a four year NT$36 billion navy program.
• Hadrian signed a seven year agreement with Lockheed Martin to automate missile production at Grand Prairie, Texas, for PAC-3 MSE, THAAD, PrSM and GMLRS.
• Ukrainian drones hit a Sberbank data center in Russia, after strikes on Yandex data centers disrupted services in Central Asia.

Drones and uncrewed vehicles

Taiwan's navy and coast guard are acquiring 292 MQ-35A V-BAT surveillance drones from Shield AI. The coast guard has received 12, and the navy plans to buy 280 under a four year NT$36 billion program. Taiwan could become the largest V-BAT operator outside the United States. Taiwan and Shield AI

Underwater, Saab, the Swedish Defence Materiel Administration (FMV) and the Swedish Armed Forces launched a demonstrator for a Large Uncrewed Underwater Vehicle after sea trials. It will be used to develop software, sensors and autonomous functions for future underwater operations. Saab

On the ground, Ottawa based Dominion Dynamics and Ukrainian company TENCORE signed a memorandum of understanding to build TENCORE's TerMIT uncrewed ground vehicles in Canada with Dominion's AuraNet autonomy stack. Initial production is targeted for 2027, for Ukraine, with an Arctic hardened version planned for Canada and NATO allies. Havoc says the Army Applications Laboratory awarded it an SBIR Phase III contract to expand its software that coordinates logistics resupply across air and ground platforms, building on its selection in the Army's xTech Overwatch program. Dominion Dynamics and TENCORE · Havoc

Monopulse raised more than €2 million from Coinvest Capital, Plug and Play, LitBAN, NGL Ventures and 68 angel investors for drones resistant to electronic warfare. The money goes to production, research and entry into Scandinavian and other markets; its surveillance technology is used by the Lithuanian and Danish armed forces. Monopulse

Contracts and production

Hadrian signed a seven year agreement with Lockheed Martin to bring its Opus software platform, automated manufacturing and wider factory network into Lockheed's Grand Prairie, Texas, facility. The companies plan to commission manufacturing cells from early 2027 to support PAC-3 MSE, THAAD, PrSM and GMLRS production. Hadrian and Lockheed Martin

The U.S. Air Force will buy atmospheric data from WindBorne Systems' fleet of about 700 autonomous weather balloons under a contract worth up to $49 million, with $1.7 million in orders placed so far. WindBorne uses the data for its WeatherMesh AI forecasting model. PTC renewed the Air Force's use of Servigistics for service parts planning under the ESCAPE program. WindBorne · PTC

Bridge Defense received a one year agreement with up to $63 million through the CDAO Tradewinds pathway for its CodeBridge software engineering and deployment services in secure government environments. U.S. Special Operations Command places the first orders, and other Department of War components can use the agreement. Accrete renewed its contract with an unnamed international defense partner for Argus, which tracks narratives, influence campaigns and audience behavior. Bridge Defense · Accrete

Software for soldiers and readiness

Reveal Technology launched Farsight 2.0, a 3D mapping and terrain platform that combines drone, satellite and sensor imagery into a continuously updated model for Army units, with offline analysis, autonomous drone tasking and Nett Warrior integration. The launch came with a new $9.5 million U.S. Army purchase order for more infantry brigades. Reveal Technology

Air, formerly Govini, added user controlled data ingestion, workflow orchestration across the enterprise and mission execution centers to its Enterprise Readiness platform. The company says the platform is used to maintain more than $140 billion in national security assets. At AUSA 2026, Sage Technologies launched DPVS digital night vision goggles with AI image enhancement and compatibility with ATAK. Air · Sage Technologies

Strikes on Russian data centers

Drone attacks on Yandex data centers in Russia between 8 and 11 October disrupted taxi, delivery and related services in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Services were partly restored in Uzbekistan. On 14 October Ukrainian drones struck Sberbank's Balakovo data center; the bank said its systems remained operational. Damage to supercomputers used for AI training remains unclear. Yandex · Sberbank

Anthropic and the Pentagon

Anthropic asked the D.C. Circuit to reconsider its September decision upholding the Pentagon's supply chain risk designation, which barred contractors from using Anthropic's AI models. A separate San Francisco court ruled in August that the designation violated Anthropic's First Amendment rights. Anthropic

Also

North Korea tested a high speed torpedo that uses AI for target detection and guidance, state news agency KCNA reported, after more than 180 propulsion trials over five years. North Korea