Terra Industries‘ unmanned ground vehicle, known as the Duma, will now come equipped with machine guns as the defence startup begins building combat-ready systems.
The Nigerian startup, which started out by building UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) and UGVs (Unmanned Ground Vehicles) for surveillance systems, is now taking it a step further by adding weapon systems to its unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs).
Earlier this year, when Terra announced its $11.75 million seed funding, it said it was re-entering Africa’s defence market after briefly exiting it and identifying itself solely as a drone manufacturer.
Back then, Terra Industries CEO Nathan Nwachuku told Techpoint Africa that there were serious geopolitical issues to navigate, which made the company stop building systems for the Nigerian military.
However, since its fundraising, the company has backtracked on its previous stance and now says, “We need to protect Africa’s critical infrastructure from terrorist attacks. We have been a bit wary of calling ourselves a defence company, but now we’re doing it fully.”
Interestingly, the company recently signed an agreement with Nigeria’s Defence Industries Corporation of Nigeria (DICON) aimed at strengthening local defence production and reducing the country’s reliance on imported military technologies.
Nwachuku also noted that beyond capital, Terra’s investors were selected for their experience building similar hard-tech and defence-focused companies.
“They’ve been instrumental in helping us think through complex geopolitics, how to build a robust and flexible supply chain that is sanction-proof, and how to attract the best talent.”
While the details of Terra’s project with the Nigerian government remain unclear, it signals the company’s growing focus on defence technology and the kinds of systems it intends to build going forward.
Victoria Fakiya – Senior Writer
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Terra Industries declined to provide further comments on their combat-ready systems.
Editor’s note at 4:43 pm WAT: The article has been updated to reflect the correct terminology for describing unmanned ground vehicles.
