By David Jeans
NEW YORK, March 18 (Reuters) – Erik Prince, the founder of private military firm Blackwater, is backing a Ukrainian drone technology firm he wants to help sell to the U.S. military, underscoring Kyiv’s rising role as a hub of innovation in modern warfare.
Prince, who last year joined the board of Ukrainian drone software firm Swarmer, told Reuters that four years of war with Russia had allowed Ukrainian defense companies to rapidly develop low‑cost drones, software and electronic warfare tools.
“Ukraine is the leading battle laboratory in the world,” Prince said, adding that U.S. defense companies had struggled to compete due to higher manufacturing costs and limited battlefield experience.
“There’s a lot of phenomenal defence tech in Ukraine that needs to come to the West quickly, properly and at scale.”
The war in Ukraine and recent conflict in the Middle East have underscored the outsized impact of low‑cost technologies, including drones, autonomous boats, jamming equipment and advanced software, against far costlier systems such as fighter jets and missiles produced by legacy prime contractors.
Swarmer, which raised $15 million in a Nasdaq public offering this week, is one of a growing number of Ukraine‑based military technology companies targeting U.S. and European sales.
UKRAINE AS MILITARY TECH HUB
Earlier this month, UFORCE, which makes the Magura unmanned speedboats used to sink multiple Russian vessels, announced it had raised funding from U.S. investors at a $1 billion valuation, though it has yet to disclose a U.S. contract.
In recent weeks, the U.S. Army sent to the Middle East 10,000 Ukrainian‑made drones developed by Project Eagle, a firm backed by former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt, according to Bloomberg News.
Schmidt was also an early backer of Swarmer, founded in 2023 to develop software allowing Ukrainian soldiers to control drone swarms. U.S. chief executive Alex Fink told Reuters the software is capable of controlling nearly 700 drones, though this has not yet been demonstrated.
Swarmer’s shares have surged about 500% this week.
Despite its battlefield use, the company remains unprofitable and has no U.S. military contracts. It generated just over $300,000 in revenue in 2025, down slightly from 2024, while losses widened to more than $8 million.
In a regulatory filing, the company said it expects to generate $33 million in revenue over the next two years.
(Reporting by David Jeans; Editing by Joe Brock and Daniel Wallis)
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