Epirus and Anduril Pair Microwave Weapon With AI Command System to Counter Drone Swarms

American defense company Epirus has announced the integration of its high-power microwave (HPM) system, Leonidas, with Anduril Industries' AI-based command-and-control software, Lattice. The combined system can detect, track and neutralize entire drone swarms in a single autonomous operation, and was recently demonstrated to the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory.

A $66 Million Contract and Four Prototypes

The story begins in January 2023, when the U.S. Army's Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office awarded Epirus a $66 million contract. The goal: building four prototypes of the Leonidas system, a high-power microwave weapon designed to strike entire drone swarms at once, rather than engaging each drone individually.

• Client: Rapid Capabilities and Critical Technologies Office, U.S. Army
• Contract value: $66 million
• Signing date: January 2023
• Scope: Four prototypes of the Leonidas system

How Does a Microwave System Counter a Drone Swarm?

Unlike kinetic interceptors such as missiles or gun systems, which can only strike one drone at a time, Leonidas emits directed electromagnetic radiation that disables the electronics of every drone within its operational range simultaneously. This is the logic placing HPM at the center of the counter-drone defense debate, especially as the threat shifts from a single drone to a coordinated attack wave of dozens of small aircraft.

Epirus and Anduril Connect Sensor to Decision

In July 2023, Epirus announced it had integrated Leonidas with Lattice, Anduril Industries' AI-based command-and-control platform. Until now, human operators had to manually pass targeting data between a detection system and a neutralization system, a step that costs critical time when dealing with a moving swarm. The new integration creates a single continuous workflow, in which the system detects, tracks, classifies and neutralizes drones as one automated process.

• Leonidas: Epirus's high-power microwave system
• Lattice: Anduril's AI-based command-and-control software
• Integrated functions: detection, tracking, classification and neutralization
• Recipient of demonstration: Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory

Industry Trend: Splitting the Work Between Hardware and Software Makers?

The Epirus-Anduril integration reflects a broader direction in the counter-drone defense industry. More and more companies are choosing not to build an end-to-end system on their own, instead pairing purpose-built hardware from one manufacturer with sensor-fusion and decision software from another. This approach shortens development timelines, but it also raises interesting questions about mutual dependency between suppliers, legal liability in case of failure, and whether militaries will want to rely on an integration chain made up of two separate contractors instead of a single provider.

The demonstration for the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory offers a first proof point, but it remains far from operational deployment in the field. The core questions, how fast the system's real response time is against a large swarm, what its actual effective range is, and how it handles hardened or electronically shielded drones, remain without a full public answer at this stage.