Episodes

Austin Gray, co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer at Blue Water Autonomy, returns to the show to break down what it actually takes to build large unmanned ships that can operate for months without touch maintenance. We get i...

Olaf Hichwa joins the podcast to break down the reality of modern drone warfare, FPVs, and why small drones now drive the majority of battlefield casualties. Drawing on direct exposure to Ukraine and deep experience building ...

Congressman Pat Harrigan (NC-10), former Army Special Forces officer and defense manufacturer, joins the show to talk about why he ran for office after the fall of Afghanistan and what that moment signaled to adversaries. We ...

Scott Sanders is the Chief Growth Officer at Forterra . Scott joins us to talk about counter-UAS, unmanned systems, and why scaling hardware is fundamentally different from software. We cover USVs and UGVs, recent fundraising...

Shannon Vaughn breaks down how modern China actually works, why the CCP’s primary objective is regime survival, and how that shapes everything from AI policy to military strategy. In this episode, we’re joined by Shannon Vaug...

Defense tech, robotics, and edge AI are moving fast, but scaling them in the real world is hard. Hunter Dunbar, Chief Product Officer at Luxonis, joins the show to break down embedded computer vision, AI hardware, and percept...

Mike Weigand, Founder and CEO of Aventra Defense Systems, joins the show to unpack a radically different approach to long-range strike and mass precision. Aventra Defense Systems Mike Weigand on LinkedIn Aventra is building l...

Drew Horne, founder and CEO of GreenMet, joins the show to break down the rare earth crisis and what the United States needs to do to remain competitive. He previously led critical minerals policy work inside the White House,...

Morgan Murphy joins the show to talk national security, defense manufacturing, and why he’s running for U.S. Senate in Alabama. Murphy is a 26-year Navy Reserve captain, former Pentagon press secretary, and national security ...

Emma Bates, co-founder and CEO of Cachai, joins the show to break down what true drone swarming actually means and why almost no one has achieved it. Drawing from her background in defense modernization and distributed system...

Dan Magy, co-founder and CEO of Firestorm, returns to the show for a live episode recorded at Battlefield 2027. Firestorm is building deployable, modular 3D printing systems that can manufacture drones, parts, and tools direc...

Rob Sladen is the Chairman and CEO of Zulu Pods, a company pioneering next-generation lubrication and fluid delivery systems for aerospace and defense. Before founding Zulu Pods, Sladen spent 13 years at Pratt & Whitney desig...

John Ferry returns to the show for one of the most blunt conversations yet about the defense startup ecosystem. From the realities of selling to government and surviving the “valley of death” to the cultural dysfunction insid...

Church Hutton, Chief Growth Officer at AV Inc. (formerly AeroVironment), joins the show for a deep dive into the future of autonomous systems, directed energy, and defense innovation. A retired Army officer and longtime Hill ...

Jeff Wright, founder and CEO of SplashOne Robotics, joins the show to discuss how his company is developing small, purpose-built fighter drones to redefine air superiority. A former Marine and Air Force Special Tactics Office...

Max Vozoff, Chief Technology Officer at X-Bow Systems, joins the show to discuss the urgent challenges and opportunities in America’s solid rocket motor industry.

With decades of experience, including early work a...

Todd Graetz, co-founder and CEO of Aerolane, joins the show to share how his aviation startup is reimagining air cargo with autonomous glider-based aircraft. From his early work launching one of the first large-scale drone pr...

Jon Dandrow , CEO of Radenso and Strikeman, joins the show to talk about building advanced radar detection systems, modular sensing hardware, and consumer-to-defense innovation. From hacking traffic cameras in his college yea...

Matt McCrann, U.S. Navy veteran and CEO of DroneShield US, joins the show to talk about the evolving fight against drone threats. From handheld jammers like the DroneGun MkIV to advanced sensor fusion and AI-powered RF detect...

Troy Demmer is the co-founder and Chief Product Officer of Gecko Robotics, the industrial tech company behind wall-climbing inspection robots and the full-stack software platform reshaping how we manage critical infrastructur...

Mike Canty, co-founder and CEO of Armaments Research Company, joins the show to discuss the future of defense tech and the realities of building hardware startups for the Pentagon. A former Army major, Mike now leads ARC in d...

Kyle Hardy, CEO of Hardy Dynamics, and Ashkan Bayatpour, U.S. Navy Reserve Officer, join the show to break down the future of drone warfare and the challenges of building software for autonomous swarms. We dig into the realit...

Defense tech insider Patrick Blumenthal breaks down the latest developments in Ukraine's drone warfare evolution and the Vector vs. RedCat lawsuit shaking up the industry. From Russia's new evasion modules and radar warning r...

Russia’s ambitions extend far beyond Ukraine. In this episode, we’re joined by two experts with deep regional and strategic insight: former Army intelligence officer Matt Tavares, and Anna Borshchevskaya, Senior Fellow at The...