Here’s an interview of The DroneShield CEO and Managing Director Oleg Vornik by Market Herald. In this interview Oleg talks about current big contract wins and is upbeat about the future. In it he states they are expecting to release a great set of results for the 2022 year. 2023 is expected to be a transformative year for DroneShield.

Also, Oleg states that DroneShield has been in Ukrainian since Feb 2022.

“Network of 100+ in-country partners globally”. That’s huge!

https://vimeo.com/787815161

The following is from an investor email I received:

2022 and early 2023 to date has seen a number of milestones for DroneShield, including:

• Record $11 million order received in December followed by another $11 million order from a different Government customer
• Recommendation by the Joint Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office (JCO) as part of the SAIC Team's offering for deployment of its Counter-UAS as a Service across US Department of Defense nationwide across the US, expected to commence this year
• SBIR project awarded by US DoD with partner Quantum Research International
• Successful completion of the Australian DoD Defence Innovation Hub project
• The first U.S. airport deployment
• Numerous $1m+ deployments with the U.S., European and other Government customers,
• Appointment to the Australian Department of Defence Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Electronic Warfare Standing Offer Panel.
• $3.7 million investment from Epirus Inc, a high-growth U.S. defense technology company developing software-defined directed energy systems
• New partnerships with Teledyne FLIR, Nearmap, Allen Vanguard and XRG, while strengthening and making additional sales through existing partnerships with BT, Trakka and Thales
• Launch of a dedicated testing facility in Australia
• Deployments at Davos and IRONMAN Texas
• Brazil presidential inauguration (held in early January 2023)

DroneShield CEO, Oleg Vornik, commented: “2023 is expected to be a transformative year for DroneShield, following our maiden $11 million sale order in December followed by another $11 million order from a different customer, as the counterdrone industry continues to rapidly grow, with DroneShield is a pioneer and global leader in this sector.”

“Ukrainian conflict (where we have been deployed since the start in February 2022 on the Ukrainian side) has clearly demonstrated the potential of drones and counterdrone systems on the battlefield, coupled with significant non-military use cases for intelligence community, airports, prisons, border security, stadiums, and other facilities. Nefarious use of drones is a global and rapidly rising threat, with DroneShield providing proven market leading suite of solutions, directly and also via our network of 100+ in-country partners globally.”

Wow! Yet another $11M order, i.e. worth more than the record breaking 2021 total revenue. And that revenue is expected to be realised in the March and June quarters.

By my back of the hand calcs, expected revenue is already twice the record set in 2021 financial year and should easily be more than 2022, even with that also expecting to be a record year.

Talk about growth! And I expect this to just be the start.

Nice exposure for DroneShield.

It’s no wonder they are nervous about drones, following the recent run-in they had with them at a recent public event.

How cool are the photos of guards sporting DroneGuns. I do hope those photos go viral

DroneShield Protects Brazil Presidential Inauguration

DroneShield Ltd (ASX:DRO) (DroneShield or the Company) is pleased to advise its DroneGun Tactical™ counterdrone/C-UAS system has been utilised in the inauguration ceremony for the president-elect of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, held at the Cathedral of Brasilia. 

Lula da Silva, a 77 year-old who already served as Brazil's president from 2003 to 2010, is taking the Presidential office for the third time.

Presidential security has utilised DroneGun Tactical™ to neutralise four suspicious drones that were heading towards the President at the inauguration event. 

Tens of thousands of people have attended the ceremony. 

Image: A security agent walks with DroneShield’s DroneGun Tactical™ next to the presidential Rolls-Royce that was used by President-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva at his inauguration ceremony in Brasilia, on January 1, 2023 (Photo by CARL DE SOUZA / AFP)

DroneShield has expanded into the Brazil market in mid 2021, when it has received a formal approval from Anatel, the Brazilian National Telecommunications Agency responsible for issuing the concession of new radio frequencies, for deployment of its devices. Following the approval, the Company has now sold a quantity of its DroneGun Tactical™ units to Brazilian Government. 

DroneShield CEO, Oleg Vornik, commented: “Brazil is a key South American market for DroneShield, and we are pleased to see deployment of our systems in the country at the highest level, which is expected to flow down to further systems being utilised in Brazil, as counter-UAS requirements continue to rapidly grow.”

Image: Brazil media coverage of the DroneGun Tactical™ at the Presidential inauguration (credit: Globo)

More successes for DroneShield—key decision makers from both Canada and the US involved. The following received today in an email.

DroneShield Successfully Completes Canadian Military Exercise

DroneShield Ltd (ASX:DRO) (DroneShield or the Company) is pleased to advise it has successfully completed the Counter Uncrewed Aerial Systems Sandbox 2022 exercise in Alberta, Canada. 

The Canadian Joint Operations Command (CJOC) has lead the exercise, coordinating with the Canadian Army, Royal Canadian Navy (RCN), Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF), and Canadian Special Operations Forces Command (CANSOFCOM). The exercise represented a blending of requirements and characteristics of interest to one or more of the services, as well as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP).

The US Department of Defense’s Irregular Warfare Technical Support Directorate (IWTSD) has also participated in the CUAS 2022 Sandbox as an official Application Evaluator and Observer, giving international exposure, expertise, and feedback the participants.

Image: DroneShield DroneSentry-X

DroneShield CEO, Oleg Vornik, commented: “North America is the single largest market for DroneShield, and Canada represents a growing segment, where we already have an existing customer base along with a pipeline of further projects. This exercise was a valuable opportunity to connect with key decision-makers at a number of Government agencies, and demonstrate our latest C-UAS capabilities to these existing and prospective customers.”

Image: DroneShield RfPatrol

A single order worth more than the record breaking 2021 total revenue. And on top of news that 2022 will be the 6th year in succession of record revenues. Now that IS positive news. And only the tip of the iceberg IMHO.

During 2022 DRO placed a foot in the potentially lucrative US airport market with its first installation. When that single installation proves its worth, many others will follow suit.

This is a week old now (interview was on 19 Oct 2022) but still VERY interesting. It contains a 7 minute interview with DroneShield CEO Oleg Vornik discussing the US DOD testing and endorsement process.

US Department of Defence endorses Australian company Droneshield

This endorsement means the US Department of Defence has now recommended Droneshield to form part of its solution to counter unmanned aircraft systems.

It seems yesterday’s meeting was extremely timely with DroneShield today announcing a win with the US DOD.

HOW DID the CEO contain himself and not let on about this? Well done.

DroneShield Recommended by U.S. DoD’s Joint Counter-small UAS Office (JCO)

DroneShield Ltd (ASX:DRO) (DroneShield or the Company) is pleased to announce it has been recommended by the U.S. DoD’s Joint Counter-small Unmanned Aircraft Systems Office (JCO) as part of the Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) joint solution for Counter-UAS as a Service (CaaS).

The JCO formalized its recommendation of three approved solutions after thorough evaluation at Yuma Proving Ground earlier this year. The SAIC team, “developed and demonstrated a robust SoS (System of Systems) architecture, with layered sensors and effectors to cover long range to mobile to last-line-of defense,” the JCO recommendation stated. 

The multi-layered and comprehensive solution presented by the SAIC team leveraged several of DroneShield’s dismounted, mobile, and fixed-site detection sensors and electronic countermeasures. 

Matt McCrann, DroneShield US CEO, commented, “We are pleased to complement the overall SAIC solution with key components for both extended-range detection and defeat. We look forward to supporting this partnership and further expansion of critical Counter-UAS capabilities across the services.”

SAIC is a Fortune 500 technology integrator, headquartered in Reston, Virginia, with annual revenues of approximately $12 billion. SAIC supports the defense, space, civilian and intelligence markets with mission critical solutions.

The JCO was established in 2019, as the US DoD’s Executive Agent office for all C-UAS activities. This recommendation follows the recent $1.8 million DroneGun MKIII acquisition by the U.S. DoD in September 2022.

Image: DroneShield DroneSentry system including RfOne detection sensors and DroneCannon defeat devices

About DroneShield

DroneShield (ASX:DRO) provides Artificial Intelligence based platforms for protection against advanced threats such as drones and autonomous systems. We offer customers bespoke counterdrone (or counter-UAS) and electronic warfare solutions and off-the-shelf products designed to suit a variety of terrestrial, maritime or airborne platforms. Our customers include military, intelligence community, government, law enforcement, critical infrastructure, and airports globally.

DroneShield quarterly released yesterday.

DRO September 2022 Quarterly.pdf

$5.6M cash receipt this quarter, with $50M sales pipeline for remainder of 2022, and $180M for 2023 onwards. That is rather explosive sales growth if all turn into real sales. The world is getting rather nervous about the threats drones represent. And rightfully so too.

Cashflow positive quarter.

The following slide from the investor presentation sums things up nicely. So they are in the Ukraine. Interesting.

DroneShield relieves major update. But I think that is somewhat underselling the changes. The integration of the wearable RfPatrol drone detector is brilliant. Every soldier/security guard can now become a mobile extender of the umbrella of influence/control.

And to think, when I first invested in DroneShield, I rather innocently thought they would be great for deterring drones from sensitive areas, such as airports. Especially good for detecting attempted acts of terrorism. But the war in Ukrainian has proven that drones are a very effective, and an essential, technology in the field of war (even for special exercises), and this is obviously an area that DroneShield was thinking all the time, Personally, I‘d love to know if DroneShield technology is being used in Ukraine, but I suppose we may never know. It is interesting that Ukrainian drones are having significant impact and the only news about Russian drones, that I have seen, are the numbers that have been destroyed.

The following is from an email I received from DroneShield this morning.

DroneShield Releases DroneSentry-C2 Command-and-Control System Update

DroneShield Ltd (ASX:DRO) (“DroneShield" or the “Company") is pleased to announce it has released the latest v8.0.0 version of its DroneSentry-C2 Command-and-Control System. Both secure cloud-hosted and on-premises editions of the DroneSentry-C2 software receive quarterly software updates, which include upgrades to DroneShield’s edge computing server (SmartHub), computer vision AI engine (DroneOptID) and sensor fusion (ComputeNode) components of the system.  

This major update of DroneSentry-C2 includes security improvements including patches for zero-day vulnerabilities, bug fixes and performance improvements.  

Major upgrades include:  

• Integration of additional FLIR Thermal Cameras: Adding to the suite of cameras integrated into the DroneSentry-C2, the FLIR Ranger HDC MS 1200 and Ranger HDC MR Electro-Optical (EO) and Infra-red (IR) capable cameras have been integrated as plug and play options. Optical DroneOptID computer vision models have been refined for thermal cameras.  
• Integration of the RfPatrol: When paired with compatible MANET-radios the wearable RfPatrol drone detector can now provide near real-time drone detection alerts and sensor location data fully integrated into the common operating picture of the DroneSentry-C2 user interface. This provides situational awareness across multiple RfPatrol devices in the field from a single map view. 

 Image: RfPatrol wearable drone detection sensors tracked on DroneSentry-C2

• Usability improvements: User feedback has been incorporated to improve the usability of settings such as radar masking, RF filtering, flexible sensor setup and drone detection display. These improvements greatly reduces average setup time, cognitive burden, and time needed for training.  
• Video Labelling: Video recordings can now be labelled for the purposes of feedback to DroneShield for DroneOptID AI Model training. 
• Streamlined Analytics: Historical data is now intelligently filtered and low-value data is deleted. This reduces the amount of storage required for on-premises users and reduces cognitive burden on operators viewing analytics.  
• Video tracking and optical model improvements: DroneOptID enhancements include improved optical drone tracking and identification. 

Angus Bean, DroneShield’s Chief Technology Officer, commented, “This major software update, incorporates a substantial amount of end-user feedback, which enhances all facets of the DroneSentry-C2 system including user experience, performance, security, and the number of integrated sensors and effectors. DroneShield is uniquely positioned as a bleeding edge technology manufacturer of individual sensors, as well as a systems integrator, enabling our team to optimise the ecosystem experience for our end users.”

About DroneShield

DroneShield (ASX:DRO) provides Artificial Intelligence based platforms for protection against advanced threats such as drones and autonomous systems. We offer customers bespoke counterdrone (or counter-UAS) and electronic warfare solutions and off-the-shelf products designed to suit a variety of terrestrial, maritime or airborne platforms. Our customers include military, intelligence community, government, law enforcement, critical infrastructure, and airports globally.

How fantastic is this as a marketing exercise to get the DroneShield name out there.

The following is a copy of the content of an eamil I received today from DroneShield.

DroneShield Named as a Finalist for SECAF’s Government Contractor of the Year Award

March 30, 2022, Warrenton, Virginia – DroneShield (ASX:DRO), global leader in C-UAS AI-enabled solutions, today announced that it was selected as a finalist for the 14th Annual Small and Emerging Contractors Advisory Forum (SECAF) Awards. The event honours small and emerging government contractors and the players in the industry that rely on these businesses.

DroneShield is a finalist for the Government Contractor of the Year Award, recognising companies that have shown a compelling and profound commitment to excellence in financial performance.

DroneShield CEO Oleg Vornik, commented, “We are pleased with the growing adoption of our C-UAS solutions across a range of U.S. Government agencies, across body-worn, vehicle and fixed site solutions, as unmanned threats continue to grow.”

“The SECAF Awards give us an opportunity to highlight the small and emerging contractors that are succeeding in our market; along with the people, in and out of government, that are driving our market to success,” said Mitchell Ross, Principal at Acquisition and Management, LLC, and Chair of the SECAF Board of Directors. “DroneShield exemplifies the successful journey that can result from a commitment to serving the public sector market.”

Image: DroneShield DroneSentry-X system in deployment

About DroneShield

DroneShield provides Artificial Intelligence based platforms for protection against advanced threats such as drones and autonomous systems. We offer customers bespoke counterdrone (or counter-UAS) and electronic warfare solutions and off-the-shelf products designed to suit a variety of terrestrial, maritime or airborne platforms. Our customers include military, intelligence community, Government, law enforcement, critical infrastructure, and airports globally.

About The 14^th Annual SECAF Awards Gala

The 14^th Annual SECAF Awards Gala is the premier commemorative event honoring the small and emerging government contractors and the players in the ecosystem that rely on small business. The event will be held at the Awards Gala on Thursday, May 5, 2022. To register or for more information, visit here.

About The Small and Emerging Contractors Advisory Forum

For more than 20 years, the Small and Emerging Contractors Advisory Forum (SECAF) has empowered government contractors to scale and succeed. SECAF is comprised of the senior leaders from active government contractors and established service providers. Members have access to the connections, events, education, tools and resources needed to stay on top of industry trends, win government contracts, and experience exponential growth. For more information, visit www.secaf.org

I received an email from DroneShield this morning and thought I'd share it here. It seems to be quite positive and opens some doors for DroneShield in the UK.

UK MOD SAPIENT Compliance Reached

DroneShield Limited (ASX:DRO) (“DroneShield" or the “Company”) is pleased to advise it has reached compliance with UK Ministry of Defence (UK MOD) SAPIENT format. SAPIENT is a common operating format for defence devices (with similar principles to the US Department of Defense ATAK system), originally developed by the UK’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL). It was since adopted as the standard counter drone communication system in the UK.

SAPIENT offers a standard approach for AI and autonomy in networked multi-sensor systems in security and defence, and is being evaluated as a potential NATO standard for counter-drone systems.

Additional information on SAPIENT is available at https://www.gov.uk/guidance/sapient-autonomous-sensor-system

Going forward, DroneShield’s AI-enabled counterdrone/C-UAS RfPatrol, RfOne, and DroneSentry-X products now have the capability to provide a SAPIENT compliant output.

Image: DroneSentry-X system, now with SAPIENT interoperability

Oleg Vornik, DroneShield CEO, commented, “In the current challenging geopolitical environment, DroneShield continues to substantially progress our engagement across the NATO militaries, and specifically UK, alongside Australia and the US. We have on-the-ground team members in all 3 countries, supported by a network of highly capable local partners – in the case of UK, our partner is BT with its substantial defence credentials, as well as being a household name in the UK market.”

“Compliance with the SAPIENT format was driven by end-user requests from our UK and European militaries. It ensures our networked devices are plug-and-play compatible to the common operating format of other devices and systems of those end-users. We are currently involved in meaningful acquisition tender processes with UK and European end-users, which require this compliance as part of the deployment.”

Further Information

Oleg Vornik

CEO and Managing Director

Email: [email protected]

Tel: +61 2 9995 7280

About DroneShield Limited

DroneShield (ASX:DRO) provides Artificial Intelligence based platforms for protection against advanced threats such as drones and autonomous systems. We offer customers bespoke counterdrone (or counter-UAS) and electronic warfare solutions and off-the-shelf products designed to suit a variety of terrestrial, maritime or airborne platforms. Our customers include military, intelligence community, Government, law enforcement, critical infrastructure, and airports globally.

Here’s a preview of the presentation DroneShield will be giving at the upcoming Investor Day tomorrow 7 Dec 21

some takeouts:

• Expecting to be cash flow positive in 2022
• They are calling 2021 a pivotal year.

And you have to admire the growth in repeat business.

I feel no need for any words!! The following from DroneShield's quarterly report.

It starts!

With international travel starting to open up, airports around the world will have to seriously continue to look into protection against drones. These discussions, and spending in this area, has most likely been side-lined while planes have been grounded. I think this may open up a lot of revenue for DroneShield who can once again start getting heavily involved in this area. I do hope DroneShield have already commenced the courtship process in prep for an onslaught of interest.

Defence contract wins of late should help get their foot in the door also.

Droneshield getting its foot in the door of a VERY important arena. The US Department of Homeland Security.

And as the world opens up to travel, I suspect airports around the world will be knocking on DroneShield's door also. During shutdown, I suspect drone development and terrorists use of them have not been asleep, unlike the airports who have concentrated on cutting costs and most likely placed all counter-terrorist plans on hold at a time when they really should have been taking the opportunity to get fully prepared.

The following is an email I got sent as a DronShield investor.

DroneShield Collaborates with the US Department of Homeland Security

DroneShield Ltd (ASX:DRO) (“DroneShield" or the “Company”) has announced the purchase of several of its DroneSentry-X systems, providing on-the-move Counter-UAS (C-UAS) capabilities to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”). DroneShield continues to strengthen its collaboration with DHS and several of its component agencies on multiple fronts.
 
In February 2021, DroneShield entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate (“DHS S&T”), the group within DHS primarily tasked with collaborating with private sector organizations on development of new technologies, and subsequent adoption by U.S. Government agencies. 
 
As a result of the partnership, DroneShield has undergone significant field trial evaluation working closely with DHS S&T throughout the year
 
Oleg Vornik, DroneShield’s CEO, commented, “Our working relationship with DHS and their guidance and input, has enabled DroneShield to rapidly increase our product capabilities for the continuously emerging C-UAS threat. Within the homeland security context, there is a significant and rising terrorist threat where small drones or sUAS can be effectively used by nefarious parties as a payload delivery and surveillance platform. In addition, there is an increasingly complex U.S. Border situation where small drones are used by drugs and human smugglers, and other illegal activity, creating a need for effective and adaptable counter-UAS solutions.”
 
In addition to its work with Homeland Security agencies, DroneShield has recently been awarded multiple contracts for its C-UAS solutions by U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and other Federal and State level government and law enforcement agencies, for both domestic and overseas deployments. ”

Droneshield has now gone underwater--in a good way. Adding sonar detection of underwater objects. That sounds like an area that had been overlooked and should add to their offering.

DroneShield SonarOne