Israeli Honor: The Pentagon signed a multi-year deal worth about $982 million with Uvision (Yigal Enclosure) to purchase the Hero 120 loitering UAV
This is an unusually large deal and notable for the manufacturer’s identity, constituting one of the Pentagon’s largest deals with a young Israeli supplier.
The Hero 120 weighs about 24 kg, has a range of about 60 km, an endurance of about an hour, and can carry a combat warhead of 4.5 kg. The system has already been purchased previously by US special forces ($73 million last year), the Marines, Gulf countries, and customers in Europe.
The move sends a message to the market: it seems the Pentagon is encouraging the entry of small companies and startups with cheap and fast-developing technologies – which poses a threat / call for update to the established defense industries in Israel (IAI, Rafael, Elbit) and for the Ministry of Defense to also nurture smaller players.