Overview
- The Pentagon published an RFI and timeline that sets industry responses in mid-December, a Request for Solutions on December 17, vendor selections in late January, and the first Gauntlet competition on February 16, 2026.
- Initial orders target 30,000 small one-way-attack drones for delivery by July 2026, with purchases exceeding 200,000 in 2027 and more than 300,000 by early 2028, backed by about $1 billion to fund roughly 340,000 units overall.
- Across four phases, the department will increase quantities while cutting unit price from about $5,000 toward roughly $2,300 and narrowing the field to five vendors by the final phase.
- Systems will be scored on completing a 10 km strike in open terrain and a 1 km strike in simulated urban terrain with at least a 2 kg payload, pointing to FPV-style quadcopters as likely candidates.
- Contracts are fixed-price with no progress payments, vendors bear development and manufacturing risk, and leaders frame the effort as a response to lessons from Ukraine and costly air-defense intercepts, even as industry capacity remains a key question.