Explaining the defense tech market to a board or investors? Get defensible numbers

Updated October 202670+ pagesPDF

Defense Tech by the Numbers
Cover of NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech by the Numbers report, 2026 edition
How much does it cost to shoot down a drone? Often far more than the drone. A Stinger missile costs ~$480k, as much as ~14 Shaheds. Interceptor drones now stop Shaheds for $2,000 to $15,000, and lasers are tested at a few dollars a shot. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
How long would startup money fund US defense? About 10 days. Defense startups are on pace to raise ~$28B in 2026, while the US budgets ~$2.7B a day for defense. Europe and Canada’s extra NATO money, ~$300B a year, would last ~4 months. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Who builds the most drones? Ukraine. It plans to build about 10 million drones in 2026, after ~4 million in 2025. Russia builds ~6,000 Shahed-type drones a month, and the US ~100,000 drones a year. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Does Anduril take most of the defense tech money? Not most, but by far the biggest share. Anduril alone took 27% of the $32.8B raised by defense startups recently. With nine others, the top 10 take 73%. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Who is really ahead in defense tech, Anduril or Helsing? Anduril, on 4 lines of 6. It is worth three times more, raised three times more money and holds a US Army framework contract worth up to $20B. Both have their own factories, and both had setbacks in Ukraine. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Do battle-tested Ukrainian startups get the money? Barely. Ukraine built ~4 million drones in 2025, yet its startups raised only ~$59M in disclosed rounds recently. That is ~1% of what German startups raised. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Is Anduril worth more than the old defense giants? More than some of them. At $61B, Anduril is worth more than Thales, Rheinmetall, L3Harris or Saab. Yet its ~$4.3B of expected 2026 sales are 2 to 6 times smaller than theirs, and ~19 times smaller than Lockheed’s. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Are defense startups winning Pentagon contracts? Not many yet. The 100 best-funded US national-security startups raised ~$118B but have won ~$16B of federal contracts. Anduril is the exception, with an Army framework contract worth up to $20B. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.
Did the defense stocks that listed in 2025 and 2026 hold up? Mostly not. Seven of the 11 defense companies that listed in 2025 and 2026 trade below their IPO price, most of them down ~50%. Swarmer, Arxis and Karman are the exceptions, up 60% to 96%. Chart from NewMarketPitch's Defense Tech report.

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  • How big the market really is today
  • How fast it’s growing, and why
  • Why the forecasts disagree so much
  • Which segments and regions lead
  • Who are the top companies today
  • Who’s getting funded, and by whom
  • What are their valuations
  • Which business models are winning
  • What are the biggest unsolved problems
  • What has changed in the last 12 months
  • Where are the biggest opportunities
  • Who are the likely future winners
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Verified data with sourcesUpdated in October 2026