The biggest autonomy story this week is the U.S. Air Force awarding production contracts for its first fleet of Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA):
- General Atomics will produce the FQ-42
- Anduril Industries will produce the FQ-44
- The Air Force also awarded separate autonomy software contracts to:
- Anduril
- General Atomics
- Lockheed Martin
- Northrop Grumman
- Collins Aerospace (RTX)
- Shield AI
A notable shift is the Air Force’s decision to separate software procurement from airframe procurement, allowing autonomy software to evolve independently from the aircraft platform. This mirrors commercial software development practices and could accelerate innovation.
Why it matters: This is one of the clearest signals yet that military aviation is transitioning from prototype autonomous aircraft to operational fleets of AI-enabled “loyal wingmen.”
