As soon as per quarter, the Joint Interagency Discipline Experimentation (JIFX) crew on the US Naval Postgraduate Faculty holds weeklong workout routines devoted to demonstrating rising applied sciences seen by the Division of Protection (DoD) as important to nationwide safety. Held at California’s Camp Roberts, JIFX week supplies a chance for collaboration throughout the army branches, and between the army and the non-public sector.
The newest JIFX week, held in February, featured amongst its contributors Firestorm Labs, the corporate behind the xCell containerized additive manufacturing (AM) system, designed for tactically deployed drone manufacturing. In January, Firestorm landed a five-year, $100 million Air Drive contract to develop 3D printed drones.
At February’s JIFX week, an xCell unit powered by startup Chariot Protection’s cellular high-voltage battery-powered generator churned out elements for Firestorm’s Tempest drones. The printed elements included nosecones with digicam ports, fuselage segments for carrying payloads between 10 and 20 kilos over ranges of 100-675 miles, and various wing and tail segments.
Picture courtesy of Firestorm Labs through LinkedIn
In a DVIDS article in regards to the workout routines, the director of JIFX, retired US Military Particular Forces Colonel Michael Richardson, stated, “This February occasion was essentially the most partaking experimentation week since earlier than the pandemic. A part of that was the climate. The periodic heavy rain and powerful winds gave our collaborating corporations the identical difficult circumstances their applied sciences might be anticipated to carry out in if a part of the fleet or pressure. …A number of corporations achieved firsts with their methods and practically everybody collaborated in an ad-hoc experiment or two that demonstrated their capability to handle operational challenges extra successfully collectively.”
The VP of {hardware} at Firestorm Labs, Invoice Buel, stated, “The concept for xCell got here to fruition in order that we may manufacture our drone on the edge in a contested logistics surroundings. However throughout growth, we realized there’s additionally a wider want for xCell as producer for spare elements and different drones. It doesn’t even should be our drones. So, we actually embrace that. We’ve taken an operator first strategy, and we need to empower the operator to make this really modular.”
Picture courtesy of Daniel Linehan, NPS, through DVIDS
Over the course of virtually a decade, the US army — and the US Navy, specifically — has proven rising curiosity in utilizing AM to allow expeditionary manufacturing items, with containerized methods driving the success of corporations like SPEE3D. Now, that basis seems to be hitting an inflection level as frontline drone manufacturing turns into an evermore essential functionality within the wake of conflicts in Ukraine and the Center East.
In that vein, expeditionary items could take over from rocket motors as “the large factor” for AM within the protection contract world, which might give Firestorm Labs an honest shot at turning into the subsequent Ursa Main. Apparently, in an interview from final yr with Ursa Main co-founder (and then-CEO) Joe Laurienti, Laurienti informed me that drones are one of many areas the corporate is seeking to discover down the highway, suggesting the potential for collaboration between Firestorm and Ursa.
It is usually value mentioning that, on the February JIFX week, a laser weapon system (LWS) was used for the primary time, which succeeded at destroying Group 1 UAS methods (totally different from these produced by Firestorm). Alongside the usage of lasers to provide the Firestorm drones, that is solely the newest growth to focus on how important fiber lasers are to US provide chains, a difficulty I wrote about at the start of 2024, and which appears poised to solely change into extra related within the present commerce conflict surroundings.
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