Shield AI raises $1.5B at $12.7B valuation

Autonomous military aircraft maker Shield AI announced on Tuesday that it has secured $1.5 billion in Series G funding, which is a late-stage funding round. This transaction values the company at a post-money valuation of $12.7 billion. The capital injection is structured through a combination of equity investments, preferred shares, and a debt facility to support the company’s acquisition of Aechelon Technology:

• Lead Equity Investors: Private equity firm Advent, which states it has a $1 billion budget to invest in defense technology, and a JPMorganChase investment group served as the lead investors for the Series G round.
• Preferred Shares: Funds managed by Blackstone purchased $500 million of preferred shares.
• Debt Facility: Shield AI also lined up a $250 million loan that the company can draw on at a later date.
• Other Participants: Additional investors participating in the Series G round include Snowpoint Ventures, InnovationX, Riot Ventures, Disruptive, and Apandion.

The capital from this round is helping Shield AI acquire Aechelon Technology, a maker of flight simulation technology used to train U.S. military pilots. The terms of the Aechelon Technology acquisition were not disclosed. This new funding round represents a 140% valuation increase for Shield AI over its previous funding round in March 2025, when the company raised $240 million at a $5.3 billion valuation. This valuation jump follows a milestone in February, when the U.S. Air Force selected Shield AI’s Hivemind—the company’s autonomy software—as a provider for the Collaborative Combat Aircraft drone prototype program.

Under the U.S. Air Force program, Shield AI’s Hivemind software was selected to work with competitor Anduril on Anduril’s “Fury” autonomous fighter jet. While Anduril utilizes its own command software, called Lattice, to operate the Fury aircraft, the U.S. Air Force’s selection indicates that the military branch does not want to be locked into a single vendor for the entire software stack of its drone fleet. Anduril previously raised $2.5 billion at a $30.5 billion valuation in June. Separately, Anduril is reportedly looking to raise up to $8 billion at a $60 billion valuation.

Why it matters

Shield AI’s valuation jump highlights the growing demand for autonomous defense software, as the U.S. military moves to diversify its vendor base beyond single-source providers.