The contract has been announced while the Secretary for Defence John Healey was in the US on March 6 for an important visit and talks with his American counterpart. The contract is valued at circa £30 million (€35.7 million) and financed by the International Fund for Ukraine (IFU), which is administered by a panel consisting of the UK, Norway, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Lithuania.
The number of drones to be procured is undisclosed. Deliveries will happen over the coming months, directly from the Anduril production lines in the US. The ALTIUS series of drones is particularly famous in its “tube-launch” form which is being experimented for air deployment from helicopters and drones such as the MQ-9. The drone variant has a longer endurance and carries only sensors, while the “M” variants are loitering munitions with warhead.
The UK MoD mentions both the 600M and 700M, but part of the order might be made of “pure” drones for reconnaissance. The 700M carries a payload of up to 14.9 kg with a loiter time of 75 minutes and a range of 160 km. The 600M is smaller, but in its drone variant has an endurance of 4 hours which is mentioned in the MoD-produced graphic, again suggesting that at least some of the 600s will be in recce configuration. Anduril claims that the ALTIUS family can operate with swarm tactics, thanks to a high degree of autonomy lowering the workload on the operator.
The Altius-M munitions are understood to use artificial intelligence for a portion of their navigation and target detection. The production of the ALTIUS family is currently concentrated in Atlanta, Georgia, a facility Anduril has invested millions of dollars in. Unspecified numbers of ALTIUS have already been provided to Ukraine and have been used to take out “hundreds of millions of dollars” of Russian equipment.
Anduril has a small but growing presence in the UK which is said will be “rapidly scaled” upwards in connection with the Labour government plans to strengthen the defence industry capability in the UK. Some sources claim that Anduril is “hoping” to open its second “ARSENAL” mega-factory for multi-system production in the UK after picking Ohio for the first. A stated aim of UK purchases of drones for Ukraine is to expand the national capabilities in terms of design and production of drones of various types.
It must also be noted that the British Army’s Army Air Corps and Defence Equipment & Support (DE&S) have been working with Anduril for a few years, specifically looking at the potential of ALTIUS drones as Air Launched Effects. Already in 2022 ALTIUS 600 integration work was being carried out, in the UK, with the AW-159 WILDCAT reconnaissance helicopter.
While the current status of ALE experimentations is unclear, this award might indirectly also signal further support for that project.
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