DIU, NorthCom partner up to confront the military’s ‘most pressing’ counter-drone challenges

The Defense Innovation Unit and U.S. Northern Command are set to launch two opportunities Monday that are designed to accelerate the military’s access to capabilities that can detect, track and counter certain enemy drones, while reducing risks to people and assets on the ground.

In a press release and conversations over email, officials unveiled a new prize challenge for low-cost sensing technologies to enhance counter unmanned aerial systems and — in partnership with the Joint Counter-small UAS Office — a new solicitation for “low-collateral defeat options” that can be quickly integrated into existing C-sUAS programs of record across the joint force via the Replicator initiative.

“DIU’s low-cost sensing prize challenge combined with the LCD [solicitation] are a part of the overall strategic push to get after the toughest challenges and most pressing C-UAS problems identified by the warfighter,” David Payne, the unit’s C-UAS program manager, told DefenseScoop.

The new announcement marks the latest move associated with the Defense Department’s high-stakes — but hush-hush — Replicator effort. 

DOD leadership under the Biden administration established Replicator in August 2023 as a key military technology and procurement modernization initiative. At the time, it was billed as a strategic campaign to confront China’s massive, ongoing military buildup by incentivizing U.S. industrial production capacity and the DOD’s adoption of advanced warfare technologies en masse — through replicable processes — at a much faster pace than has been achieved before.

Tranches within the first capability focus area, Replicator-1, broadly encompass the purchase and making of loitering munitions and other technologies associated with all-domain autonomous systems. In September 2024, Pentagon officials revealed plans to prioritize the high-volume production of C-UAS capabilities through Replicator-2.

In DIU’s press release, officials wrote that Replicator aims to “deliver strategic capability and to build new innovative muscle for” DOD, and that the forthcoming solicitation aligns with the Trump administration’s recent executive order entitled “Modernizing Defense Acquisitions and Spurring Innovation in the Industrial Base.” 

The solicitation will be open for submissions from industry through May 16. 

Officials also noted that the call for LCD capabilities is envisioned to supply the military with the “most effective defeat options” for increasingly complex and custom-built drones — and also “help to minimize risk to friendly forces, civilians, and infrastructure in the homeland and abroad.”

“North America faces a variety of non-traditional threats, and key among these is the use of small uncrewed aircraft systems operating near installations and critical infrastructure — addressing these threats is a top priority and essential task,” NorthCom Commander Gen. Gregory Guillot said in the press release. “Partnering with DIU to employ low-collateral defeat capabilities is one example of how we are developing the forward-looking capabilities and policies necessary to ensure a seamless and well-coordinated defensive enterprise.”

The call for capabilities will also build on other ongoing DOD technology-enabling efforts, including collaborative work with the United Kingdom.

A DIU spokesperson told DefenseScoop that this is the first time the unit launched a bilateral commercial solutions opening where the U.K. government’s Ministry of Defence was involved from the start. They also confirmed that this effort “is very much part of the new U.K. Defence Innovation organization that will officially be stood up in July.” 

“This is both nations leveraging the commercial sector to develop novel technology to solve a defense requirement,” the spokesperson said.

Regarding the separate prize challenge that DIU is also posting Monday, the official said that it seeks “to enhance the DOD’s [C-UAS] capabilities while addressing cost and scalability limitations associated with traditional radars, optical sensors, and radio frequency detection systems.”