Shield AI
Assembly Line
Shield AI Raises Additional Capital in Series F, Boosts Total Amount to $500M
Shield AI, the defense technology company building the world’s best AI pilot for aircraft, today announced the expansion of their Series F funding round to a total of $500 million. An additional $100M in equity, raised at the Series F price, and $200M in debt from Hercules Capital were added to the initial $200M in equity closed in November.
Shield AI’s flagship product, Hivemind, is an AI pilot that enables teams of intelligent aircraft to operate and complete missions autonomously in high-threat environments, without the need for remote operators or GPS. Hivemind is an aircraft agnostic autonomy stack similar to the self-driving technology found in cars. It has flown quadcopters, the MQ-35A V-BAT, and the F-16. Next year it will fly Kratos’ XQ-58 Valkyrie. Shield AI has accumulated more autonomous flight hours executing fighter jet maneuvers, like dogfighting, than any company in the world.
Shield AI Raises $200M, Reaching $2.7B Valuation
Shield AI, the defense technology company building the world’s best AI pilot for aircraft, today announced it has raised $200 million in Series F funding in an oversubscribed funding round. This funding, led by U.S. Innovative Technology Fund (USIT) and co-led by Riot Ventures, with participation from Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest and returning investors Disruptive and Snowpoint, values Shield AI at $2.7 billion.
Shield AI builds an AI pilot called Hivemind, which enables teams of intelligent aircraft to operate autonomously in high-threat environments on the edge, without the need for remote operators, command inputs, or GPS. The technology approach is similar to those in the self-driving car industry and its software stack is aircraft agnostic, allowing Shield AI to provide autonomy to a variety of form factors across the aerospace industry. This announcement comes on the heels of the company’s recent launch of its V-BAT Teams product. This product enables a single human operator to command a minimum of four V-BATs, generating real-time AI-driven flight paths, and exhibiting dynamic read-and-react behaviors autonomously. Except for lethal decision-making, V-BAT Teams can complete missions from start to finish without the need for an operator or pilot.