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Anduril has officially launched its Barracuda-M family of air-breathing, software-defined expendable autonomous air vehicles that are designed for affordable, hyper-scale production.
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Anduril’s Barracuda family of autonomous air vehicles (AAV) is compatible with a host of payloads and employment mechanisms, supports a variety of different missions, and provides warfighters with an adaptable and upgradeable capability to counter evolving threats.
Barracuda-M is the munition configuration that delivers a more affordable, producible, available, and adaptable cruise missile capability than existing options available to warfighters today.
Barracuda features advanced autonomous behaviours and other software-defined capabilities and it is available in configurations offering 500+ nautical miles of range, 100+ pounds of payload capacity, 5 Gs of manoeuvrability, and more than 120 minutes of loitering time.
The company stated that the Barracuda variants include Barracuda-100, Barracuda-250, and Barracuda-500, each increment offering increasing size, range and payload capacity. Barracuda-M is the munition configuration.
Barracuda-100M, Barracuda-250M, and Barracuda-500M are the most producible cruise missiles on the market today.
Anduril stated that the design had been optimised for “hyper-scale” production through initiatives like their arsenal factories, with a single Barracuda taking 50 per cent less time to produce and requiring 95 per cent fewer tools, and 50 per cent fewer parts than competing solutions on the market today. As a result, the Barracuda family of AAVs is 30 per cent cheaper on average than other solutions, enabling affordable mass and cost-effective, large-scale employment.
The vehicle’s fast speeds, high manoeuvrability, and extended ranges are made possible by Barracuda’s turbojets, air-breathing engines that take in air to combust their fuel.
The result is a highly intelligent, low-cost weapon system that is capable of direct, stand-in, or stand-off strike missions in line with existing requirements but rapidly adaptable to future mission needs due to its high degree of modularity and upgradeability.
Barracuda brings unparalleled flexibility to the fight. It can be employed from a variety of different air, ground or maritime platforms to support a range of mission sets.
Compatible with internal weapons bays of fifth-generation aircraft, external rails of fourth-generation fixed-wing and rotary-wing aircraft, MFOM launchers and common launch tubes, surface vessels, palletised employment from airlift aircraft, and more, Barracuda provides theatre commanders with flexible employment options.
Defence innovator Anduril is deeply committed to combining modern software with cutting-edge hardware development and hyper-scale manufacturing expertise.
From autonomous fighter jets to air-breathing cruise missiles, Anduril is driving a paradigm shift in air dominance and strike that is squarely focused on affordable mass and mission autonomy.
