Ondas and Palantir launch AI venture targeting governments and defense customers
Regna AI will develop mission-specific models designed to run inside customers’ own secure environments and on autonomous systems in the field. Ondas will be its first customer, with the venture targeting defense, security and critical infrastructure markets.
Ondas and Palantir Technologies are establishing a new artificial intelligence company aimed at governments and businesses that want to use AI in sensitive operations without relying entirely on models and infrastructure controlled by outside providers.
The venture, called Regna AI, will develop specialized AI models tailored to particular missions and designed to run within customers’ own environments, including on hardware deployed in the field. Ondas, a U.S.-listed defense technology group, will initially own the company outright and serve as its first customer. Palantir will provide model-training infrastructure and help adapt the technology to customers’ operational needs.
The venture is targeting a growing challenge for military and government organizations: how to incorporate increasingly capable AI into critical operations while retaining control over sensitive data, the models themselves and the systems through which they are deployed.
Commercial AI models may offer powerful capabilities, but using them can create problems for organizations whose data cannot be transferred beyond tightly controlled security environments. Regna AI is being built around the premise that customers should be able to deploy AI tailored to their own operational knowledge and requirements without having to develop a large model from scratch.
The company plans to begin with intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, or ISR, and expand into other defense applications, as well as security, critical infrastructure and industrial markets.
One of its central use cases is the operation of autonomous systems in environments where communications are unreliable, intermittent or deliberately disrupted. Its models are intended to run on platforms including drones, stratospheric balloons, ground vehicles and surface vessels, as well as command-and-control systems.
The software is designed to help operators evaluate evidence, compare possible courses of action and suggest updates to mission plans. Those proposals would remain subject to human review and authorization, according to the announcement.
Regna AI will build on an existing collaboration between Ondas and Palantir involving SkyWeaver C4I, an open-architecture system designed to integrate surveillance capabilities spanning the stratosphere to the tactical edge. The companies say that work provides an operational foundation for the new venture’s models in environments involving multiple types of platforms and limited connectivity.
Palantir, whose software is used by government and commercial organizations to manage and analyze operational data, will provide the training infrastructure for Regna AI. The companies will also work together on engineering tailored to customers’ workflows.
Last month, Ondas, which employs around 1,000 people in Israel, continued its aggressive acquisition spree in Israel, acquiring three defense technology businesses for a total of $56 million. The acquisitions of Insignito, Ottopia Defense and Caribou Labs means the company has assembled a portfolio of more than 15 businesses over the past two years, with acquisitions spanning drones, robotics, counter-drone systems, intelligence, communications and other defense technologies.
