Blackwater founder Erik Prince joins drone-warfare fray in Ukraine

After multiple sources previously told the Guardian that Erik Prince – Maga ally and founder of the now defunct mercenary company Blackwater – was looking to work with Ukraine's invaluable drone sector, recent Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) documents confirm he now is, Report informs.

Swarmer, which bills itself as a battle-tested Ukrainian startup specializing in autonomous drone software, filed for an initial public offering and has recruited Prince to help sell the company as non-executive chair.

"Swarmer is a software-first defense technology company focused on collaborative autonomy and intelligent swarming, originating from the cauldron of modern combat in Ukraine," said Prince in a letter to prospective stockholders in the filing, released earlier this month.

"Since April 2024, Swarmer's platform has been deployed in Ukraine with more than 100,000 real-world missions in active combat environments, informing the software and machine-learning models that feed into it."

On its website, Swarmer lauds endorsements from the newly installed Ukrainian defense minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, who is aggressively lobbying the US and other Nato allies to buy into his country's weapons industry. Swarmer products, powered by artificial intelligence, are on the cutting edge of the future of war, with software enabling pilots to control drone swarms.

Swarmer mentions the potential profits in drone warfare in the same filing, noting to investors that "defense forces, including the US Department of Defense [and] Nato allies," see "autonomous drone operations" as "requiring immediate investment."