DETROIT—Defense startup Epirus has secured a new Army contract to deliver a pair of high-powered microwave systems that can make a swarm of drones fall from the sky, following years of prototypes and recent tests in the Indo-Pacific.
Military use of the technology—which can stun anything with a computer chip in its tracks—to counter unmanned aerial systems comes as global conflicts are demonstrating how consequential drones can be on the battlefield and at home.
“The frequencies we operate are all based upon smart electromagnetic interference frequencies,” Andy Lowery, Epirus’ CEO, told Defense One on the sidelines of a new manufacturing summit, Reindustrialize. “It’s basically just absorbing right into the circuit boards and into the computer boards and into the wires that consumer electronics are built with. And so it works for drones, which are like flying computers…it will stop an Elon Musk Tesla in its tracks, it’ll stop a boat motor in its tracks, anything with a computer inside of it, it will not allow the computer in the field that we produce.”
That electronic dead zone is produced by an antenna that scans the environment and creates a “60-degree-by-60-degree wall of energy,” that will “drop” any number of drones.
The $43.6 million contract announced Thursday adds to the Army’s four existing Epirus Leonidas systems, and comes as the military is increasing its use and incorporation of drone and counter-drone technology in operations as well as to protect infrastructure—particularly tech that doesn’t disrupt neighborhoods and minimizes potential casualties.
The two electronic warfare systems are scheduled to be delivered by the end of the year, after which they’ll be tested to determine if it meets expectations, Lowery said.
Epirus wants to change the landscape of how wars are fought, and to expand its offerings to other government customers for homeland defense, public safety ,and high-profile convoys.
Defense One caught up with Lowery to talk about it.
What’s the first order of business with this new contract?
Two systems we’re delivering…one is coming fully, officially delivered in October. The other is fully, officially delivered in December. And then, once those two systems are together and delivered, they’re going to bring those systems back to their very famous proving ground, which is [Naval Air Weapons Station] China Lake.
We’re going to run a full up gamut of different tests [to] really understand if the system meets the engineering expectations, which is about two-and-a-half times the range of Generation I. And if we meet those numbers—we meet those criteria—the Army has indicated that they’re positive about moving forward.
What’s the range of the system?
The Army has [defined] layers: what’s called the short-range air cylinder, a 10 kilometer-radius cylinder that goes to 600 feet [above ground level], and then there’s a final protected fires layer. That cylinder is between one and two kilometers radius, 600 feet AGL, and they vary. They want the [Indirect Fire Protection Capability-High-Power Microwave] system to defend that ring.
So, at least 1 kilometer?
I can’t tell you what it officially is. I can say that’s what it needs to be to fit into that mission.
How big are these systems?
It scales up and down in size. And our smallest system right now is around a six-element system that can go around 15- or 20 yards in total range. The largest system has [about] 50-ish elements [and is used for] base defense. And that’s what Generation II is bound to do. But that tech plugs into all the rest of the systems. So, as the generations of tech increase—like we’ve gone from Gen I to Gen II—that will now apply to all the architecture. Everything gets two-and-a-half times, with the Generation II technology being the primary technology that we’re going to go to market with.
What are your plans, not just for Leonidas, but also the company overall as demand for counterdrone systems increases?
So, the first lane is a broad expansion of this platform, which is ubiquitous in so many areas, both civil and military. There’s a need and demand for these types of systems. We started thinking of IFPC-HPM, which is the name of the Army mission to defend bases like Tower 22 in Jordan, that it was niche and it had a nice sized market. But [that’s not] really what we’re seeing today.
This is a platform, this is a force field. You want force fields around C-17s. You want force fields around vehicles. It begins to look like a massively ubiquitous market, where different systems—weight, power, cost, ranges—are protecting different valuable assets.
The second is to go deep on the supply chain because we have our own Anduril rocket motor problem. Our problem is more around the high-powered amplifiers and what we call the [line replaceable amplifier modules]. That LRAM needs to be built at scale. And in the U.S., right now, we do not have that kind of capacity. We did back in the early 2000s when we had all the base stations and cellular networks getting installed all over the world.
It’s very difficult to find supply chains. So one idea for Epiris is to plumb down to the third-tier supplier network, use our IP and innovation in transmit chains to help support companies. There’s all kinds of different markets for high-powered microwaves, broadly and globally.
What are some of the challenges ahead?
One concern we have is, of course, just the traditional military-industrial culture. The culture is to reward saying ‘no,’ not to reward saying ‘yes.’ There’s just a general wringing your hands, no one makes a commitment. ‘I’ll be done with my tour in two more years, so I’ll just kick it to the next guy to make the final decision.’ I mean, there is just this prevalent culture of that. And I think that’s one big risk.
We are under a ticking time clock with our investors. This is not a gravy train forever. It’s not a nonprofit. They are absolutely looking for big returns on investment, and they need to start seeing examples of that, or they’re going to shy up and say, ‘This isn’t lucrative…it’s patriotic.’ So there needs to be practical advancement in a timely manner.
What’s your biggest worry?
My biggest worry is my ability to scale. We’ve got seven systems in progress right now. But if 70 were to be the ask? One of our systems has 148,000 parts in it—15,000 are build-to-print, 135,000 are commercial-off-the-shelf. It is not easy to swing from seven to 70. It is a very, very complex supply chain problem. It’s a very, very complex operations problem, manufacturing problem, testing problem, calibration problem, position problem, support problem.
There’s a lot of companies in the neo-prime military space that have that makeup and sell COTS—commercial-off-the-shelf, like cell phones. They’re using commercial items and making them militarized, and then selling them in a commercial way. We’re not doing that. We’re more like the Oppenheimer company, the 21st Century Skunk Works.
We’re here to completely upend the whole plan for China. Like, that’s the type of technology that this works on. We work on the solutions, and say, if this gets fielded, it changes the nature of this war. And that’s what I think the implications are of Leonidas. Leonidas is a system that will change the very strategy that countries are coming up with. Because no longer will the cost equation stand in their favor. It’ll stand in our favor. They will shoot $30,000 drones at us, and we will drop them in the water, one after the other after the other. And that doesn’t matter if it’s a drug cartel or Houthis, or a big state like China, if you’re not having effectiveness with the systems you’re fielding, it ends up becoming a waste of money on your side. That’s what we’re on the cusp of being able to provide for the country and for the warfighter and for even the Department of Homeland Security.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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