US-Saudi Venture to Build Shahed Drone Clones in Riyadh
The MASNA Ventures fund that will back the drone facility aims to capitalize on increased defense cooperation between the US and Saudi Arabia, which was named a major non-NATO ally in November, when Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman met President Donald Trump at the White House
A joint venture between a US defence startup and a Saudi firm is building a factory near Riyadh to manufacture combat drones modeled on Iran’s Shahed system, which has been used to pummel Gulf countries over the past few months.
The facility is being developed by SR2Vector, a new partnership between Utah-based Vector Defense and Saudi-based startup SR2 Defense Systems. It will build a one-way attack drone developed by Vector, dubbed SKYWASP, that is capable of hitting targets up to 1,500 kilometers (930 miles) away — about the distance from the kingdom’s northeast coast to Tehran.
“SKYWASP is a program that can level the playing field and boost Saudi Arabia’s deterrence capabilities,”
Lucien Zeigler, SR2’s chief strategy officer and co-founder, told Semafor.
Zeigler didn’t provide figures for the factory’s output, but said it will produce “operationally relevant volumes consistent with the kingdom’s strategic deterrence requirements.” He declined to give a timeline for the start of production, or disclose the size of the investment involved.
SR2Vector will produce drones both for the Saudi domestic market and for export to allied countries. It will be backed by MASNA Ventures, a defense-tech fund that Zeigler is currently raising.
Source: SEMAFOR
