Anduril goes under the sea with its latest acquisition
Anduril Industries' acquisition of Dive Technologies puts the buyer further into the maritime domain. COURTESY OF ANDURIL
By
Ross Wilkers
Anduril Industries is achieving fast growth as a start-up in the defense sector as it makes another deal to build its maritime domain expertise.
One of the defense market’s most successful venture capital-backed startup companies has completed another acquisition of an emerging technology player focused on the autonomous and maritime domains.
In purchasing Dive Technologies, Anduril Industries is adding a suite of unmanned vehicles that operate under the seas and are designed for both defense and commercial applications. Terms of the transaction announced Wednesday were not disclosed.
Anduril is undertaking a similar strategy to that of the other larger defense hardware companies that have also acquired unmanned underwater vehicle businesses in recent years. Some of those purchases also focused on the underlying technologies that enable the platforms such as sensors and software.
“The decision to go undersea was not random,” Anduril Chief Strategy Officer Chris Brose told our sibling publication Defense One regarding Dive Technologies. "When we look at the kind of operating environment that the DOD is going to have to confront, being undersea is much more compelling than being on the surface.”
Dive Technologies was founded in 2018 and is headquartered in the Boston suburb of Quincy.
The company built its flagship DIVE-LD vehicle for applications such as long-range oceanographic sensing, undersea battlespace awareness, mine countermeasures, anti-submarine warfare, seabed mapping and infrastructure health monitoring.
Where Anduril sees opportunity for combined and improved capability is seen in its autonomy software called Lattice OS, which the company will incorporate into the next generation of Dive Technologies’ vehicles, plus the incorporating of more additive manufacturing techniques.
For Anduril, this acquisition is the third it has announced over the past 12 months including that of unmanned aircraft maker Area-I in the spring of 2021. Following that was the purchase of sensing technology firm Copious Imaging later in the fall.
Earlier this month, Anduril booked a potential $967.7 million contract with Special Operations Command to work on prototyping of systems to counter adversarial unmanned aerial systems. Anduril beat out 11 other companies for that 10-year award.
Gunderson Dettmer LLP served as legal adviser to Anduril on its acquisition of Dive Technologies, the latter of which counted Polsinelli LLP as its legal adviser. Covington advised Anduril on government contracts and national security matters.