USA
Mach Industries wins DIU contract for a ship-launched long-range strike drone
A three-year-old startup just won the Pentagon's bet to put a 1,400-nautical-mile strike drone on the deck of a destroyer, no flight deck or runway required.
Mach Industries' Atlas is a hybrid-electric, runway-independent strike drone being developed under DIU's RIMES program to carry 1,000-pound munitions 1,400 nautical miles from destroyer decks and austere sites — and come back to rearm.
A three-year-old startup just won the Pentagon's bet to put a 1,400-nautical-mile strike drone on the deck of a destroyer, no flight deck or runway required.
Defense-tech venture funding hit a record $14.6 billion in the first five months of 2026, per Crunchbase. The companies drawing the biggest checks build what Ukraine's front increasingly runs on: cheap, mass-produced autonomy.
Mach Industries raised a $300M Series C at a $1.8B valuation to expand its Forge factory network, the latest sign that defense-tech money is moving from prototypes to mass production.