Notes from Ukraine - by Pieter Garicano - Silicon Continent

I spent last week in Kyiv writing a piece (forthcoming) about what the rest of Europe could learn from Ukraine in defense tech. Inspired by this piece by Dwarkesh, I wanted to share some impressions from the trip and conversations with people there. It was my first time in the country; I won’t pretend to ‘understand’ it. I have included three sections — drones, war, and impressions.

These impressions are based on conversations with people in industry and government, though I couldn't independently verify them, so caveats apply.

The impression you can get from the international press' portrayal of Ukraine's drone industry is misleading. There is usually an emphasis on artisanal garage-style manufacturing (perhaps due to site access). The reality is that large manufacturers dominate the production of both Kamikaze/FPV drones and surveillance equipment. The top two FPV producers each produce around 40,000 drones monthly. One official mentioned that the same firm won 11 of 12 recent procurement competitions.

What distinguishes major producers from peers isn't innovation or manufacturing capability, but logistics. Success comes from securing large volumes of components from Chinese and Indian production lines and efficiently transporting them to Ukraine. The manufacturing process for FPV drones itself is relatively straightforward. High-end surveillance (ISR) drones occupy a different market with more exquisite systems and much lower volumes — 300 units is a very large order. (There are also tens of thousands of off-the-shelf low-end surveillance drones being used every month.)

Leave a Comment