Anduril, a rising force in defense technology, is on the verge of a breakthrough moment: the company is just weeks away from the maiden flight of its highly anticipated collaborative combat aircraft, or CCA.
This drone, designed to operate alongside advanced U.S. Air Force fighter jets, is set to showcase a leap forward in semiautonomous aviation.
At the Air & Space Forces Association’s Air Space Cyber conference in National Harbor, Maryland, Air Force Secretary Troy Meink announced that Anduril’s drone wingman would likely take to the skies for the first time in mid-October.
This marks a significant milestone not just for Anduril, but for the Air Force’s broader vision for a next-generation, semi-autonomous fighting force.
Anduril’s drone, officially designated the YFQ-44A, is one of two aircraft being considered for the first increment of the Air Force’s CCA program.
General Atomics, another industry heavyweight, is in the running with its own YFQ-42A drone, which already completed its inaugural flight in August at a confidential location in California.
Despite General Atomics achieving this milestone first, Anduril officials remain confident.
During a briefing, one official described themselves as “within spitting distance” of their own first flight, emphasizing the team’s determination to stick to the program’s tight schedule.
Developing a robust fleet of these CCAs is now a central Air Force priority. The service envisions at least 1,000 drone wingmen capable of executing a variety of missions—ranging from strike operations and reconnaissance to electronic jamming and serving as decoys to attract enemy fire.
This ambitious goal underscores the pivotal role unmanned systems will play in future conflicts.
The Air Force’s strategy, laid out in April 2024, involves awarding contracts to both Anduril and General Atomics, with plans to incrementally introduce new versions and capabilities as the program matures.
In terms of performance, these CCAs are designed to be formidable.
As Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin explained in May, the aircraft will possess stealth characteristics comparable to the F-35, along with a combat radius exceeding 700 nautical miles—outperforming both the F-35A and the F-22.
The goal is for these drones to become operational later in the decade, representing a major advance in aerial warfare.
Anduril’s approach to autonomy is particularly ambitious. Diem Salmon, the company’s vice president for air dominance and strike, detailed the company’s push to ensure the YFQ-44A can operate semiautonomously from takeoff to landing.
“We hit a button, it goes to the points that’s been designated by that vehicle, completes its taxi [and] returns,” Salmon explained, noting that the aircraft has already successfully performed semiautonomous taxiing.
For the upcoming inaugural flight, the aim is for both takeoff and landing to occur at the push of a button, demonstrating a remarkable degree of trust in Anduril’s autonomy software.
“There is no stick and throttle,” Salmon emphasized. “It will be able to execute the actual first flight profile, preplanned, using autonomy software on the vehicle.” Nevertheless, human oversight will remain a part of the process, with ground operators closely monitoring the drone’s actions.
Meanwhile, General Atomics maintains a slightly different philosophy. Spokesman C. Mark Brinkley noted that their approach involves remotely piloted first flights to gather crucial data and minimize risks.
“The performance data obtained this way is invaluable to the success of our aircraft programs,” Brinkley stated.
He also reaffirmed that their own YFQ-42A is intended for semiautonomous flight, likening the transition from remote control to full autonomy to “saying I never expected my baby to crawl, but go straight from the crib to the Air Force Marathon.”
The decision by Anduril to attempt semiautonomous flight from the outset has necessitated a major engineering push, particularly in software development. Salmon acknowledged, “The team has been heads down, getting to that goal for CCA.
There’s just a little bit more on the software development side that needs to get wrung out. That’s what’s currently driving our schedule right now.”
Still, she believes that prioritizing autonomy early in the program will allow Anduril to move through the subsequent stages of testing more rapidly, effectively “leapfrogging” elements of the traditional test plan.
Jason Levin, Anduril’s senior vice president of engineering for air dominance and strike, added that building a separate ground control station for manual operation would have represented “a step backwards,” because the team’s focus is on solving the complex autonomy challenges from the very beginning.
According to Levin, bringing the YFQ-44A to its current stage has been a parallel effort, requiring simultaneous development of both the hardware—such as avionics and electrical systems—and the sophisticated software.
“But to get to the level of rigor and complexity for CCA has been a different beast to handle,” he said.
Although Anduril’s timeline has slipped slightly, with the first flight now expected in the fall rather than summer, company leaders insist that their approach is deliberate and focused on building something truly transformative.
“It was not a race to get to first flight as fast as humanly possible,” Salmon concluded. “It was, how do we field this really advanced and novel capability as fast as we can? And with that comes the recognition that the autonomy is the hard part here.”