Liteye Systems wins DoD’s $12.1 million counter-drone deal

Colorado-based anti-drone tech specialist Liteye has won a $12.1 million contract from the US Department of Defense (DoD) to provide an array of platforms enabling multi-domain air and ground security missions both domestically and abroad.

Liteye announced its win of the multiyear Pentagon contract this week. It hailed it as a victory for partner companies and its own work with the DoD in developing increasingly modern anti-drone solutions across a variety of use scenarios. 

Under the deal, Liteye will integrate its entire stable of anti-drone and ground surveillance products to detect, identify, track, and defend from Class 1 and Class 2 UAVs. Those will additionally provide both complementary and stand-alone ground defense capabilities in an array of potential environments.

“This award is the result of a long-term effort between Liteye, our partners, and the DoD to establish a vehicle to expeditiously provide critical capabilities to the warfighter,” said Kenneth Geyer, Liteye Systems CEO. “Liteye and our partners look forward to developing, integrating, and fielding these advanced capabilities with the DoD.”

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Platforms the company will produce are expected to provide surveillance, targeting, and both electronic and kinetic methods for fixed, semi-fixed, mobile, and dismounted situations. 

In doing so, it will rely on its experience developing multi-mission and -domain anti-drone tech that the company says “can be layered with multiple capacities and battle management systems to respond to threats operating in the air, on the ground, on the surface, and in the electromagnetic spectrum.”

Once delivered, Liteye’s anti-drone assets can be configured for customized use, including fixed and semi-fixed, light vehicle or manually transported, mobile, and by uncrewed robotic vehicle missions.  

Liteye describes its win of the Pentagon’s anti-drone contract as a demonstration of the “DoD’s prioritization of air and ground defense platforms, and commitment to partnering with industry to develop technology and solutions to maximize capabilities domestically and overseas.”