The DroneShield Ltd (ASX: DRO) share price is soaring today following the company's partnership news with Nearmap Ltd (ASX: NEA).
At the time of writing, the defence contractor's shares are up 4.88% to 21.5 cents. This marks the highest valuation for DroneShield since early September 2021 when the company's shares hit a 52-week high of 22.5 cents.
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What did DroneShield announce?
In its statement, DroneShield advised it has launched an enhanced version of the DroneSentry-C2 command-and-control software with support from Nearmap.
The latter provides geospatial map technology for businesses, enterprises, and government customers across Australia, New Zealand, and North America. This includes city-scale 3D content, artificial intelligence data sets, geospatial tools, and high-resolution aerial imagery.
As the DroneSentry-C2 platform is predominantly based on delivering counter-UAS [unmanned aircraft systems] awareness, DroneShield has incorporated an optional Nearmap mapping upgrade.
Nearmap's resolution is several times higher than standard satellite imagery, providing increased precision when responding to counter-UAS threats. Its mapping data is regularly updated, ensuring sites reflect the latest geospatial data for operators.
The software comes with a standard mapping solution for customers on a budget, however, a Nearmap mapping upgrade is available. This offers best-in-class mapping data for high-performance environments such as government, intelligence, homeland security, and defence markets.
The optional Nearmap mapping upgrade will be available as an annual subscription for DroneShield customers who have opted in.
DroneShield stated that the latest offer represents an additional revenue stream and is anticipated to boost its financial accounts.
While the number of expected sales is difficult to predict, the company said it will provide guidance when possible.
DroneShield CEO Oleg Vornik commented:
One of DroneShield's differentiators is that we are both a sensor manufacturer and an integrator.
Providing a streamlined and standardised hardware/software bundle that gives our user community an easy to deploy and run command-and-control software, will be critical, as more fixed and pop-up site users seek to deploy counter-UAS products.
Importantly, the offering is already validated by deployments such as US Air Force and Australian Army, amongst number of other tier 1 end users globally.
DroneShield share price summary
The DroneShield share price has almost recovered from the fallout of COVID-19. After hitting a low of 8.4 cents in March 2020, the company is tracking on an upward trajectory.
In the past year alone, DroneShield shares are up more than 31%.
With a market capitalisation of around $90 million, DroneShield has room to grow and cement itself as a leading defence contractor.
