Anduril shows Fury CCA at Avalon Airshow

In the same week that the US Air Force selected Boeing’s F-47 is its 6^th generation Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) crewed fighter, California-based Anduril Industries is showing a model of its 6^thgeneration YFQ-44 Fury autonomous Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) at Avalon 2025, which opens on Tuesday 25 March.

This is the first appearance outside the USA of the high-performance, multi-mission autonomous fighter. Fury is designed to act as a force multiplier for crewed 5^th and 6^th generation fighter aircraft, combining trusted collaborative autonomy, hyper-scale producibility, modularity, and affordability to expand the ability of US and allied forces to project combat airpower, says Anduril.

The company’s vice president for engineering is Dr Shane Arnott who, at Avalon 2019, unveiled his previous employer Boeing’s MQ-28A Ghost Shark autonomous ‘loyal wingman’, a CCA design. This is scheduled to undergo a series of Manned-Unmanned teaming (MUM-T) trials with crewed RAAF fighters  later this calendar year.

The YFQ-44 Fury was down selected by the USAF for Increment 1 of the CCA program last year. The CCA program is an effort to develop, produce, and field uncrewed fighter aircraft that will act as force multipliers for current and next-generation crewed aircraft, increasing and expanding their survivability, effectiveness, and mission capabilities. In partnership with the USAF, Anduril says its YFQ-44A is pioneering a new generation of semi-autonomous fighter aircraft that is designed to fundamentally transform air dominance by delivering highly capable, mass-producible, more affordable, more flexible, and more autonomous aircraft by the end of the decade, the company explains.

“Autonomous air systems will be crucial for achieving air superiority in future conflicts,” said David Goodrich OAM, Executive Chairman and CEO of Anduril Australia. “Our adversaries are making major investments in this area and we need to move faster to develop autonomous systems for the defence of Australia and our allies. They provide a comprehensive view of battlefield dynamics and keep our warfighters out of unnecessary danger.

“As with all our products, Fury has been designed for simplicity and large-scale production. At Anduril, we are focused on driving out unnecessary complexity, eliminating unnecessary materials, parts, tooling and specialised processes, and leveraging commercial components wherever possible. Hardware and material choices are optimised around cost, speed, simplicity and supply chain.”

Instead of using complex military landing gear on the YFQ-44 Fury, for example, Anduril designed, built, and tested its own landing gear, leveraging a design that is easier to produce at numerous suppliers and removing key risks to schedule and supply chain. Similarly, says the company, Fury is powered by a well-known, commercial business jet engine (make and type undisclosed) that offers proven performance across millions of flight hours, a robust supply chain, global logistics support, and established tooling and services requirements.

The resulting aircraft is designed for mass production by the broadest possible workforce, while limiting the bespoke logistics and support infrastructure required to maintain readiness.

Diem Salmon, Vice President for Air Dominance and Strike at Anduril, emphasised that the strength of Fury extends beyond the airframe itself and into Anduril’s hardware-agnostic, end-to-end software platform called Lattice for Mission Autonomy.

“Fielding robots is a unique challenge, but one that is critical that we get right,” he said. “Mission autonomy software is what makes that possible. Anduril’s Lattice for Mission Autonomy software platform establishes a common software baseline that makes it possible for a single human operator to interact and fight with scalable teams of diverse robotic assets, including autonomous air vehicles, maritime vessels, launched effects, and more, dramatically extending their reach, capabilities, and situational awareness.”

To date, Anduril says it has executed hundreds of live flight tests to rapidly and responsibly scale Lattice for Mission Autonomy for operational fielding of Autonomous Air Vehicles (AAVs), including Fury and other aircraft.  By integrating this system with the YFQ-44 Fury, Anduril delivers the holistic set of functions and behaviours required to field teams of autonomous fighter aircraft, transforming air dominance for the high-end fight, the company adds.

The Fury, GA-ASI’s competing YFQ-42 and Boeing’s MQ-28A Ghost Shark are all stepping stones towards a 6^th generation MUM-T capability, though it’s not known what timeline the RAAF has identified for adopting the new technology. “If Fury fills a need for the ADF, we will be ready to support the need, subject to export approvals,” said Goodrich.