Teal Drones Secures Additional $1.2M in Funding for US Army’s SSR Program
by DRONELIFE Staff Writer Ian M. Crosby
Military technology company Red Cat Holdings announced that its subsidiary Teal Drones has received an additional $1.2 million for the development of a new sUAS prototype for the U.S. Army’s Short Range Reconnaissance (SRR) program.
In March 2022, Teal was first awarded a prototype contract for the SRR Tranche 2 program, with the Army now obligating a total of $2.7 million for Teal’s participation. The company is one of only three vendors competing in Tranche 2, which is now to be the final tranche of the SRR program.
Following a series of testing and demonstration milestones, the winning vendors will be chosen to create a rucksack-portable sUAS capable of providing platoons of 20 to 50 soldiers with a rapidly deployable surveillance and reconnaissance capability. With the new funding comes additional objective requirements for the prototypes to meet, originally assigned to Tranche 3.
“A future SRR production contract is a major opportunity for any company selected, and Teal is excited to give the warfighter the best we have,” said Teal Founder and CEO George Matus. “I’m confident the SRR prototype we’re developing will meet and exceed the Army’s requirements.”
“Uncrewed systems are a disruptive technology that provide soldiers an unfair advantage on the battlefield,” said Maj. Josh McMillion, U.S. Army SRR APM. “SRR is the Army’s solution to provide this capability now to ensure our soldiers have the technological edge over the enemy in any operational environment and never have a fair fight.”
Teal’s prototype will leverage some of the same technology as its military-grade Teal 2 sUAS. Officially launched this past April, Teal 2 is designed to “Dominate the Night™.” The world’s leading sUAS for nighttime operations, Teal 2 provides the latest intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) technology, relaying urgent information and allowing operators to make faster and smarter decisions.
Teal’s technology partners for its SRR effort include Teledyne FLIR, Doodle Labs and Immervision.
Read more:
- Teal 2 Makes Blue sUAS List: Red Cat and Athena Announce New AI and Computer Vision Abilities for Teal 2 Drone
- Red Cat Launches the Teal 2: the Drone for Nighttime Ops
- Athena AI, Teal 2 Drone: Computer Vision to Identify Weapons, Friends and Foes at Night
- Rebuilding America’s Defense Industry: Utah Gov. Tours Teal Drones HQ
- New Teal Golden Eagle Drone Will Use Immervision Cameras for Low-Light Navigation
Ian attended Dominican University of California, where he received a BA in English in 2019. With a lifelong passion for writing and storytelling and a keen interest in technology, he is now contributing to DroneLife as a staff writer.
Miriam McNabb is the Editor-in-Chief of DRONELIFE and CEO of JobForDrones, a professional drone services marketplace, and a fascinated observer of the emerging drone industry and the regulatory environment for drones. Miriam has penned over 3,000 articles focused on the commercial drone space and is an international speaker and recognized figure in the industry. Miriam has a degree from the University of Chicago and over 20 years of experience in high tech sales and marketing for new technologies.
For drone industry consulting or writing, Email Miriam.
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