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What just happened? Amid an increasing number of news stories about AI-powered autonomous drones, Palmer Luckey's Anduril Industries has unveiled its latest takes on the technology: the Bolt and Bolt-M. The latter is especially impressive/terrifying, able to deliver a three-pound explosive to a target that causes the drone to self-destruct.
Luckey is still best known as the man who founded Oculus VR and designed the Oculus Rift, but he left the VR company in 2017 to found defense contractor Anduril Industries.
The first drone in the video, the Bolt, is designed for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance. Anduril's video shows it being operated via an almost Steam Deck-like handheld device as the operator programs its route on the screen.
Its AI smarts allow the drone to follow a target autonomously, even when it is obscured by the likes of trees. The Bolt is also able to discern battlefield objects such as people and vehicles. The 12-pound Autonomous Air Vehicle (AAV) boasts a 20 kilometre (12.4 mile) range and 45-minute operating time.
The other drone Anduril unveiled, the Bolt-M, is an anti-personnel, anti-material, anti-armor kamikaze drone capable of delivering firepower against static or moving ground-based targets. It has the same specs as the Bolt, though it also has a munition payload capacity of up to 3 pounds, pushing its weight up to 15 pounds.
The video states the drone can attack from any angle and initiate an autonomous strike. The sight of it annihilating the truck in slow motion looks like a scene from a movie.
Defensescoop writes that algorithms onboard the Bolt 2 can maintain terminal guidance and enable the weapon to hit its target even if connectivity with the human operator is lost during an attack. The drone is also compatible with a variety of warheads.
Both drones can be disassembled and carried inside a backpack. They take around five minutes to assemble and can be launched from anywhere.
Chris Brose, the company's chief strategy officer, said Anduril will be delivering an undisclosed number of drones to the Marine Corps over the next six months for test-and-evaluation efforts.
Anduril was awarded a $6.5 million contract to provide kamikaze drones to the Department of Defense in April. It also won a nearly $250 million contract with the DoD this month to provide 500 Roadrunner drones, designed to intercept and neutralize larger unmanned aircraft.
In August, the US Army signed a $1 billion deal to secure a fleet of Switchblade drones, which will likely be used to defend Taiwan should China ever invade.