What are the latest funding trends in Counter-UAS?

All funding deals in the counter-UAS market over the last years

Below is the table listing all the deals. You can find our methodology at the end of this page.

If you want a deeper understanding of the market and its current dynamics, get our report covering the Counter-UAS Market.

Counter-UAS funding: what is actually changing in 2026?

Is Counter-UAS funding actually growing right now?

Counter-UAS funding is clearly stronger this year, and the biggest change is the size of ordinary rounds rather than a sudden flood of new deals.

We counted about $472.3 million across 14 financings in the current year-to-date period, versus $411.4 million across 13 deals over the same dates last year. Capital is up 14.8%, while deal count is up only 7.7%.

The median round gives a much better picture of what is happening underneath. It jumped from $8.9 million to $21.5 million. Even more telling, funding excluding rounds above $50 million rose from $96.4 million to roughly $219.8 million, an increase of 127.9%.

The average disclosed round barely moved, from $34.3 million to $33.7 million, because last year's $250 million Epirus round pulled the 2025 average sharply upward. The median is more useful here: a typical funded Counter-UAS company is raising substantially more money these days.

The 2024 comparison is huge but deserves less weight. We found only three qualifying deals in that period, so the jump from $21.1 million to more than $470 million mainly tells us the market has moved far beyond its very small 2024 funding base.

Metric	Current YTD	Previous YTD	2024 YTD	Current vs previous
Deals	14	13	3	+7.7%
Unique funded companies	14	13	3	+7.7%
Total capital	$472.3M	$411.4M	$21.1M	+14.8%
Capital excluding >$50M rounds	$219.8M	$96.4M	$21.1M	+127.9%
Capital excluding >$100M rounds	$272.3M	$161.4M	$21.1M	+68.6%
Median round	$21.5M	$8.9M	$7.0M	+141.6%
Average disclosed round	$33.7M	$34.3M	$7.0M	−1.6%
Largest round	$200M	$250M	$12M	−20.0%

Is one huge Counter-UAS deal making the market look stronger than it really is?

Not really. The current Counter-UAS funding increase actually looks better once the biggest rounds are stripped out.

Allen Control Systems raised $200 million, so one transaction still represents a large 42.4% of all capital. Last year's market was much more dependent on its biggest deal, though: Epirus' $250 million Series D accounted for 60.8% of comparable-period funding.

The gap becomes clearer further down the ranking. The three biggest current rounds represent 61.9% of capital, versus 83.9% last year. The top five share dropped from 90.7% to 77%.

Most importantly, removing rounds above $50 million leaves around $219.8 million of current funding, more than twice the $96.4 million recorded a year earlier.

Allen Control Systems is a major part of this year's total, but it cannot explain the broader increase on its own. The rest of the market is carrying far more capital too.

Are Counter-UAS startups getting more funding deals, or are the checks just getting bigger?

Mostly bigger checks. The number of financed companies barely changed, while the middle of the funding market expanded dramatically.

There are 14 funded companies now versus 13 over the same period last year. That is hardly a deal boom.

Round sizes have changed much more. Five current financings fall between $20 million and $50 million, compared with only one last year. Meanwhile, the number of sub-$20 million deals fell from nine to seven.

This $20–50 million bracket is one of the clearest signs that Counter-UAS companies are moving beyond small development rounds. Frankenburg Technologies and TYTAN Technologies each raised roughly $35 million in dollar terms, while other companies have also entered this range.

The biggest transaction has actually become smaller, falling from $250 million last year to $200 million now. Yet the median round more than doubled. Much more money is flowing into the companies between the tiny Seed round and the giant late-stage financing.

Round size	Current deals	Current capital share	Previous deals	Previous capital share
Under $5M	3	0.8%	3	2.2%
$5M–<$20M	4	9.4%	6	13.9%
$20M–<$50M	5	36.3%	1	7.3%
$50M–<$100M	1	11.1%	1	15.8%
$100M+	1	42.4%	1	60.8%
Total deals	14	—	13	—
Median round	$21.5M	—	$8.9M	—
Largest round	$200M	—	$250M	—

Why are Counter-UAS companies suddenly raising $20–50 million rounds?

Counter-UAS companies are increasingly raising enough money to manufacture, industrialize and deploy systems, rather than simply prove that the technology works.

TYTAN Technologies is a good example. The company closed a €30 million Series A co-led by Armira and the NATO Innovation Fund. TYTAN said the money would expand manufacturing across Germany, Ukraine and allied markets, accelerate its AI-powered interceptors and support integration into broader air-defence systems.

Frankenburg Technologies gives us another version of the same story. Its €30 million financing is being used to build missile-manufacturing capacity and expand production in the UK and Germany. The company has also opened a missile assembly site in Riga and has been running live-fire interceptor tests.

Allen Control Systems sits further along this curve. Its $200 million Series B is explicitly aimed at scaling manufacturing and accelerating deployment of Bullfrog, its autonomous counter-drone weapon system.

Different companies, different round sizes, same bottleneck: factories, production lines, integration and deployment now require far more capital than prototype work.

Are new Counter-UAS startups still getting funded?

Yes. New Counter-UAS companies are finding money more easily than last year, although established companies still take almost all of the large checks.

We identified six first financings in the current period, twice the three we found a year earlier. Their share of all deals rose from 23.1% to 42.9%.

Ground A is one of the clearest examples. Founded only recently, the German company closed a €9.1 million pre-Seed after moving its GA 1000 laser counter-drone system out of the prototype phase and into testing and validation.

Mara is another. The US startup raised $7 million to develop Spike, an automated interceptor designed for small FPV drones and backed by investors including Khosla Ventures.

There is an obvious ceiling, though. First financings account for only $39.2 million, or 8.3% of current capital. Their median is about $4.7 million. Companies that have already raised before receive the other 91.7%, with a median follow-on round of roughly $35.7 million.

The door is open to new Counter-UAS startups, but scale capital is going overwhelmingly to teams that have already cleared an initial financing and technical hurdle.

Are Counter-UAS investors becoming more selective?

Counter-UAS investors look more willing to fund newcomers while concentrating their biggest checks on a smaller group of companies that have already proved something.

Follow-on deal count fell from ten to eight, yet the median follow-on financing rose from roughly $11 million to $35.7 million.

That is a big change. Investors are doing fewer repeat financings while putting much more money into each one.

At the same time, first financings doubled. Investors have not stopped taking early technical risk. The selectivity shows up later, when companies need tens or hundreds of millions to industrialize.

The threshold is getting sharper: a company can still raise a few million dollars around a credible Counter-UAS technology, but the really large capital pools are clustering around companies with prior funding, working systems, manufacturing plans or visible routes into military procurement.

Which Counter-UAS technologies are investors paying more attention to now?

Kinetic interceptors and integrated Counter-UAS systems are attracting much more money now, while sensors have had a noticeably weaker year.

Kinetic Defeat expanded from four to six deals and from 13.6% to 60.9% of capital. Allen Control Systems accounts for a large part of that jump, but several other companies make the change broader than one financing. Frankenburg and TYTAN each raised around $35 million in dollar terms, Askari raised $9 million and Mara raised $7 million.

Integration is a cleaner shift. Deal count stayed at four, yet capital share jumped from 4.4% to 24.1%. The category's median round increased from $5.5 million to $30.5 million. Investors are putting much larger sums behind companies building more complete Counter-UAS systems.

Electronic Defeat still recorded three financings, the same number as last year. Its capital share collapsed from 65.1% to 14.5%, but that comparison is heavily distorted by Epirus' $250 million Series D last year.

Sensors show the clearest weakness in the current sample. Only one $2.3 million sensor deal appears this year, compared with two financings and substantially more capital over the same period previously.

Counter-UAS category	Current deals	Current deal share	Current capital share	Current median
Kinetic Defeat	6	42.9%	60.9%	$22.2M
Counter-UAS Integration	4	28.6%	24.1%	$30.5M
Electronic Defeat	3	21.4%	14.5%	$18.0M
Sensors	1	7.1%	0.5%	$2.3M
Kinetic deal-share change vs previous YTD	+2 deals	+12.1 pp	—	—
Kinetic capital-share change	—	—	+47.2 pp	—
Integration capital-share change	—	—	+19.8 pp	—
Sensor capital-share change	—	—	−16.4 pp	—

Why are kinetic Counter-UAS interceptors getting so much money?

Kinetic Counter-UAS funding is rising because investors are backing several companies trying to make physical interception cheaper, scalable and easier to manufacture.

Allen Control Systems is the largest example, but it is hardly alone. TYTAN is scaling AI-enabled interceptor production. Frankenburg is building low-cost guided interceptors designed for mass manufacture. Mara is targeting cheap FPV drones with its Spike system.

Those companies approach the problem differently, yet they are all responding to the same uncomfortable economics: inexpensive drones can force defenders to use weapons that cost many times more than the target.

Recent industrial activity reinforces the point. TYTAN opened a production facility in Munich, Frankenburg opened missile-assembly capacity in Riga, and DEUTZ took a stake in TYTAN while agreeing to work on drive, battery and energy systems for drone defence.

The category still has to prove that these systems can be manufactured cheaply enough and perform reliably in large numbers. For now, investors are clearly willing to finance that attempt at a scale we were not seeing a year ago.

Has Electronic Defeat funding fallen apart?

No. The headline drop is mostly a base-effect problem created by last year's Epirus megadeal.

Electronic Defeat represented 65.1% of capital in the previous period and only 14.5% now. Read by itself, that figure looks like a collapse.

Deal count is much calmer: three financings last year and three this year. The current median round is also around $18 million, versus roughly $10 million previously.

Epirus explains most of the apparent reversal. Its $250 million Series D was raised to expand production of Leonidas, the company's high-power microwave Counter-UAS system. A single round of that size completely changed the 2025 category mix.

Electronic Defeat remains an active funding category. It just no longer has one quarter-billion-dollar financing sitting on top of the numbers.

Are investors betting on complete Counter-UAS systems now?

Yes. Investors are putting much larger checks into integrated Counter-UAS companies, and procurement is also moving toward systems that combine several sensors and effectors.

The category produced four financings in both comparable periods, so there has been no increase in deal count. Capital share, however, rose from 4.4% to 24.1%, while the median round climbed from $5.5 million to $30.5 million.

NATO procurement provides useful context. The NATO Support and Procurement Agency has established five framework contracts for tactical and deployable Counter-UAS systems built around a common command-and-control layer. The architecture can bring together radar, direction finding, electro-optical and infrared sensors, electronic-warfare effectors and hard-kill interceptors.

That is close to what buyers increasingly need in practice. A jammer, radar or interceptor can solve one part of the problem; an operational Counter-UAS network has to detect, classify, decide and defeat.

Investors appear more comfortable funding companies that own more of that chain, which helps explain why integration rounds have become much larger without generating more transactions.

Is Counter-UAS funding moving toward later-stage startups?

Counter-UAS funding is moving toward bigger scale-up rounds, but the number of early-stage deals has actually increased.

Seed and Series A represent 78.6% of current transactions, up from 69.2% previously. Anyone looking only at deal count would call the market slightly earlier-stage.

Dollar allocation gives a different picture. Series B rounds account for 58.8% of current capital, led by Allen Control Systems. We also found three Series Bs this year versus none in the previous comparable period.

Last year's mature capital was much more concentrated in one $250 million Series D and two Series C financings. This year the large checks are reaching a broader group of Series A and Series B companies.

Company age has barely changed either: the median funded company is still about two years old. Bigger rounds therefore cannot be explained simply by an older group of startups showing up in the sample.

The better reading is that Counter-UAS companies are reaching serious scale capital earlier in their financing histories.

Why is Europe suddenly producing so many Counter-UAS startups and deals?

Europe has become the busiest Counter-UAS funding region by deal count, helped by a much clearer path from defence technology to testing, procurement and production.

We counted seven European financings in the current period, up from three previously. Europe now represents half of all Counter-UAS deals, compared with 23.1% a year earlier.

Capital share rose too, from 7.5% to 29.1%, although the current European median is only about $10.6 million. The European shift comes primarily from breadth rather than one monster round.

The company activity is easy to see. TYTAN is expanding interceptor manufacturing in Germany and Ukraine. Frankenburg has been adding missile-production capacity in Latvia, the UK and Germany. Ground A appeared as a new German entrant with a €9.1 million pre-Seed.

There is also a much stronger institutional backdrop these days. NATO and Ukraine have launched a C-UAS and air-defence innovation competition with €10 million of initial contract awards and plans to expand the wider programme. NATO has started Counter-UAS testing campaigns at its Innovation Range in Latvia. More recently, Allies announced more than $40 billion of planned counter-drone investment over five years and a marketplace intended to make NATO-tested systems easier to buy.

Some of the financings happened before those announcements, so the procurement initiatives cannot explain every deal. They do give European founders and investors a much clearer demand environment.

Region	Current deals	Current deal share	Current capital share	Previous deals
Europe	7	50.0%	29.1%	3
North America	6	42.9%	67.1%	7
Middle East	1	7.1%	3.8%	0
Asia-Pacific	0	0%	0%	3
Total	14	100%	100%	13
Europe deal-share change	+4 deals	+26.9 pp	—	—
Europe capital-share change	—	—	+21.5 pp	—
North America deal-share change	−1 deal	−11.0 pp	—	—

Is North America losing ground in Counter-UAS funding?

North America is producing slightly fewer funded Counter-UAS companies, but it still attracts far more money per company than Europe.

North American deal count slipped from seven to six, and its share of transactions fell from 53.8% to 42.9%.

The median round moved the other way, from about $10 million to $30.5 million. With Allen Control Systems' $200 million Series B included, North America still receives 67.1% of all capital.

Europe and North America are developing differently right now. Europe has produced the bigger increase in the number of funded companies, while North America still dominates the large-dollar end of the market.

Calling this a European takeover would be premature. The more interesting change is that a market once heavily centered on North American capital now has a much deeper European company pipeline alongside it.

Are defence companies and strategic investors putting more money into Counter-UAS startups?

Strategic investors are showing up somewhat more often in Counter-UAS rounds, and their involvement is spreading into smaller financings.

We found disclosed strategic participation in 28.6% of current deals, up from 23.1% previously. The difference is modest, so we would not overstate it.

The company combinations are more revealing than the percentage. Lockheed Martin invested $25 million in Fortem Technologies to increase production and deployment inside Lockheed Martin's Sanctum Counter-UAS ecosystem. DEUTZ invested in TYTAN alongside a partnership covering energy, propulsion and industrialization. Quantum Systems appears among Ground A's investors.

These companies can offer something venture funds cannot provide on their own: manufacturing capability, integration knowledge, customer relationships and a route into larger defence platforms.

The median financing involving a strategic investor fell from $65 million last year to $21.5 million currently. Strategic capital is appearing in more normal-sized rounds rather than being associated mainly with giant financings.

Are lots of new VC firms suddenly entering Counter-UAS?

No. The Counter-UAS funding market has expanded much faster than the pool of investors willing to formally lead rounds.

We counted 13 unique disclosed lead or co-lead investors now, compared with 14 over the previous comparable period.

Around 79% of current deals have a disclosed lead, almost unchanged from last year. Khosla Ventures is the only investor with more than one current lead or co-lead appearance.

The investor picture is surprisingly stable. Much larger rounds are getting done, but we are not seeing dozens of new firms suddenly competing to lead Counter-UAS financings.

A one-year absence tells us very little about an individual investor's strategy, so we would not interpret missing names as exits from the sector. Company funding has deepened faster than lead-investor breadth.

Is NATO actually helping drive the Counter-UAS investment boom?

NATO is making Counter-UAS demand much more visible to investors, especially in Europe, although the funding increase was already underway before some of its biggest announcements.

The most striking move is NATO's Drone Edge initiative. Allies have committed more than $40 billion over five years to counter-drone capabilities, alongside a Counter-UAS marketplace intended to make NATO-tested and NATO-compatible systems easier to procure.

That follows several earlier steps. The UNITE–Brave NATO programme put C-UAS and air defence into its first joint NATO-Ukraine innovation competition. NATO also began Counter-UAS testing at its Innovation Range in Latvia, giving companies access to formal testing, evaluation, verification and validation campaigns.

NSPA's five framework contracts then pushed further into procurement by creating a simpler path for Allies and partners to acquire pre-qualified tactical Counter-UAS systems.

These programmes do not prove that NATO spending caused the financing growth we measured. Investors were already funding companies such as TYTAN and other European startups before the largest announcements.

Still, the environment has changed in a way private investors can understand. Counter-UAS companies now have more visible testing programmes, formal procurement routes and explicit multi-year demand from major defence customers. That makes a $30 million factory expansion or a $200 million production round easier to underwrite.

Has the current year already caught up with last year's Counter-UAS funding market?

Counter-UAS deal activity is already close to last year's full-year level, although total capital remains far below it because one enormous late-year financing distorted the previous annual total.

Full-year 2025 contained 17 deals and approximately $985.9 million of capital. The current year-to-date period has already reached 14 deals, or 82.4% of that full-year transaction count.

Capital stands at only 47.9% of the previous full-year amount.

The reason is CHAOS Industries. Its $510 million financing late last year accounts for more than half of the difference by itself. The company said the capital would support expanded product development and manufacturing.

That makes full-year capital a poor benchmark for judging the current underlying pace. Financing in defence technology is too lumpy to simply annualize nine months of activity or assume another half-billion-dollar transaction will arrive.

The useful comparison is deal activity: before the year is finished, the market has already produced most of the number of financings seen during all of 2025.

What is actually changing in Counter-UAS funding?

Counter-UAS funding looks healthier underneath the headline than the 14.8% increase in total capital suggests. The median round has more than doubled, the $20–50 million segment has expanded from one deal to five, and funding excluding rounds above $50 million has more than doubled.

More companies are also entering the market. First financings increased from three to six. Those newcomers still receive a small share of total dollars, while companies that have raised before absorb more than 90% of capital. The market can support new entrants and still be very selective about who receives scale money.

Investor attention has shifted most clearly toward kinetic interceptors and integrated Counter-UAS systems. Kinetic funding is spread across Allen Control Systems, TYTAN, Frankenburg, Mara and other companies, while integrated-system rounds are becoming much larger even without an increase in transaction count.

Europe is another genuine change. Seven European deals versus three previously is too broad to dismiss as one financing. NATO procurement, testing and innovation programmes now give European companies a clearer demand environment, even though those initiatives should be treated as context rather than a single explanation for the funding increase.

The part to watch from here is the new scale-up cohort. The real test for these $20 million, $30 million and $40 million rounds is whether they turn into factories, reliable production, field deployments and repeat orders. If that happens, the current funding shift will look less like a strong fundraising cycle and more like the industrialization of Counter-UAS.