While it shares a name with a classic cartoon character, a newly unveiled defense platform is light-years ahead of Wile E. Coyote’s nemesis. The Roadrunner and the Roadrunner-M — both built by defense contractor Anduril — are described by their makers as AI-guided, drone-hunting autonomous jets.
Thirty-one-year-old Palmer Luckey — the man behind the project — said, despite sounding like the newest high tech toy, the Roadrunners are mobile, effective and make financial sense. They can be easily deployed and keep service members out of harm’s way at a cost effective price.
Luckey is no stranger to bringing new tech to market. He is best known as the founder of Oculus and the creator of the Oculus Rift. In an interview with CNBC, Luckey said the two-year project was motivated by the increased threats to U.S. and allied troops from what are known as kamikaze drones.
The Roadrunner is different from earlier drone hunters because of its ability to quickly carry out a mission and then return to where it was launched from. This ability means the Roadrunner can be serviced and re-loaded for another mission in a very short period of time.
It can also take off and land vertically, eliminating the need for a runway and making it versatile enough to be used in any kind of terrain.
The Roadrunner-M is a long-range option carrying a high-explosive warhead that can go after jet-powered threats, protecting the troops on the ground. The base model Roadrunner can be fitted with modular payloads that can be sent to hit a specific target before turning back for another mission.
The Roadrunners aren’t just prototypes that exist only on paper. In an interview with Yahoo Finance, Luckey said these UAVs are already in production, with an unnamed U.S. military partner soon to be taking delivery.
One reason why the Roadrunner and the ‘M’ variant can be priced far below their competitors in the arena is the way Anduril develops and markets their products. Aduril builds their creations with their own money rather than looking to win a defense-funded contract for production. This approach essentially brings a ready-made defense system to the table. That’s especially important as the danger to American troops serving abroad rises.
So what will taxpayers be on the hook for when it comes to putting the roadrunner in the hands of the U.S. military? Luckey told Forbes it’s in the low hundreds of thousands of dollars.
