Anduril vs Lockheed Martin: Founders, CEOs and History

Company facts

Founders

CEOs and their tenures

Timeline: Anduril and Lockheed Martin side by side

1. 1912Lockheed Martin

   Loughead Brothers Build First Aircraft

   Allan and Malcolm Loughead complete their first seaplane, the Model G, in a rented Santa Barbara garage, charging $10 per passenger for brief flights over San Francisco Bay and launching what would eventually become Lockheed Corporation.

2. 1943Lockheed Martin

   Skunk Works Established

   Lockheed establishes the Advanced Development Projects division universally known as the Skunk Works under the leadership of Clarence 'Kelly' Johnson, producing the P-80 Shooting Star jet fighter in just 143 days and launching a legacy of classified breakthrou…

3. 1955Lockheed Martin

   U-2 Spy Plane First Flight

   The Lockheed U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft completes its first flight, entering CIA service the following year and providing critical intelligence on Soviet military capabilities throughout the Cold War as well as sparking an international incident…

4. 1964Lockheed Martin

   SR-71 Blackbird First Flight

   The Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird strategic reconnaissance aircraft achieves first flight, eventually setting a speed record of 2,193 mph for a manned air-breathing aircraft a record that stands to this day while providing strategic reconnaissance capabilities that…

5. 1991Lockheed Martin

   F-117 Nighthawk Combat Debut

   Lockheed's F-117 Nighthawk stealth attack aircraft makes its combat debut in Operation Desert Storm, striking hardened Iraqi targets with precision-guided munitions and demonstrating to the world that stealth technology had altered the calculus of air warfare.

6. 1995Lockheed Martin

   Lockheed and Martin Marietta Merger

   Lockheed Corporation and Martin Marietta complete their $10 billion merger on March 15, 1995, creating Lockheed Martin Corporation with combined revenues of approximately $23 billion, approximately 170,000 employees, and a portfolio spanning fighter aircraft,…

7. 2001Lockheed Martin

   F-35 Program Award

   Lockheed Martin wins the Joint Strike Fighter competition against Boeing, securing the System Development and Demonstration contract for what would become the F-35 Lightning II a program that has since grown into the most expensive weapons system in history wi…

8. 2006Lockheed Martin

   First GPS IIR-M Satellite Launch

   Lockheed Martin's first GPS IIR-M modernized satellite is launched, beginning the upgrade of the GPS constellation with military signals on a second frequency and laying the groundwork for the GPS III program that would follow.

9. 2015Lockheed Martin

   Sikorsky Aircraft Acquisition

   Lockheed Martin completes the acquisition of Sikorsky Aircraft from United Technologies Corporation for approximately $9 billion, adding the UH-60 Black Hawk, CH-53K King Stallion, and S-92 commercial helicopter programs and substantially expanding the company…

10. 2016Lockheed Martin

    F-35A Achieves Initial Operating Capability

    The F-35A conventional takeoff and landing variant achieves Initial Operating Capability with the U.S.

11. 2017Anduril

    Anduril founded in Southern California

    Palmer Luckey, Brian Schimpf, Trae Stephens, Matt Grimm and Joe Chen started Anduril to build defense systems with private capital and sell them finished.

12. 2018Anduril

    First sentry towers tested for Customs and Border Protection

    CBP tested the first four Anduril sentry towers in the San Diego area in early 2018, the first field use of the Lattice software, and bought 56 more.

13. 2020Anduril

    Sentry towers become a CBP program of record

    Customs and Border Protection made Anduril's autonomous surveillance towers a program of record in July 2020, planning to deploy up to 200 of them.

14. 2020Anduril

    Series C values Anduril at $1.9 billion

    Anduril raised $200 million led by Andreessen Horowitz in July 2020, close to doubling its valuation to about $1.9 billion.

15. 2021Anduril

    Area-I acquisition adds ALTIUS air-launched effects

    Anduril acquired Georgia-based Area-I on 1 April 2021, adding the tube-launched ALTIUS family that it later supplied to the US Army and, through Anduril UK, to Ukraine.

16. 2022Anduril

    US Special Operations Command counter-drone contract

    SOCOM named Anduril its counter-unmanned systems integration partner in January 2022 under an indefinite-delivery contract with a ceiling of $967.6 million over ten years.

17. 2022Anduril

    Dive Technologies acquisition opens the undersea line

    Anduril bought Boston-based Dive Technologies in February 2022, gaining the Dive-LD autonomous underwater vehicle that became the basis for Ghost Shark.

18. 2022Lockheed Martin

    HIMARS System Transforms Ukraine Conflict

    The M142 HIMARS High Mobility Artillery Rocket System, produced by Lockheed Martin, is supplied to Ukrainian forces and achieves immediate strategic impact, destroying Russian ammunition depots, command posts, and logistics nodes at ranges previously unavailab…

19. 2023Anduril

    Adranos and Blue Force Technologies acquired

    Anduril bought solid rocket motor maker Adranos in June 2023 and, on 7 September 2023, Blue Force Technologies, owner of the Fury uncrewed jet design.

20. 2023Anduril

    Roadrunner interceptor unveiled

    Anduril revealed Roadrunner and the Roadrunner-M interceptor on 1 December 2023, a twin-turbojet vehicle that takes off vertically and can be recovered if it is not expended.

21. 2024Anduril

    US Air Force selects Anduril for CCA Increment 1

    The Air Force chose Anduril and General Atomics in April 2024 to build and test production-representative collaborative combat aircraft, ending the bids of Lockheed Martin, Boeing and Northrop Grumman.

22. 2024Anduril

    Series F raises $1.5 billion at a $14 billion valuation

    Anduril closed a $1.5 billion round in August 2024, earmarking the money for hyperscale manufacturing.

23. 2024Lockheed Martin

    FY2025 Sales Reach $75.048 Billion

    Lockheed Martin reports fiscal year 2024 net sales of $71.0 billion, a 5.3 percent increase from 2023, driven by growth across all four segments and reflecting global demand for the company's defense systems in an environment shaped by the wars in Ukraine and…

24. 2025Anduril

    Arsenal-1 announced in Pickaway County, Ohio

    Anduril said on 16 January 2025 that it would build a 5 million square foot plant on a 500-acre site near Rickenbacker International Airport, an investment of about $1 billion with more than 4,000 jobs planned by 2035.

25. 2025Anduril

    Series G raises $2.5 billion at a $30.5 billion valuation

    Founders Fund led the June 2025 round, more than doubling Anduril's valuation in ten months.

26. 2025Anduril

    Ghost Shark becomes a program of record for Australia

    The Royal Australian Navy awarded Anduril Australia an A$1.7 billion contract, about US$1.12 billion, for a Ghost Shark fleet over five years after three prototypes were delivered under an ~$90.3 million (A$140 million) co-development deal.

27. 2025Anduril

    YFQ-44A Fury first flight

    Anduril's collaborative combat aircraft flew for the first time on 31 October 2025 from Southern California Logistics Airport in Victorville.

28. 2025Lockheed Martin

    FY2025 Sales Reach $75.048 Billion

    Lockheed Martin reported $75.048 billion in FY2025 net sales, $5.017 billion in net earnings, $6.908 billion in free cash flow, about 123,000 employees, and $193.6 billion of backlog at year-end.

29. 2026Anduril

    Arsenal-1 starts production and ExoAnalytic is acquired

    Anduril began building the YFQ-44A at Arsenal-1 on 23 March 2026, twelve days after agreeing to buy ExoAnalytic Solutions, which operates about 400 telescopes for space tracking.

30. 2026Anduril

    Series H raises $5 billion at a $61 billion valuation

    Thrive Capital and Andreessen Horowitz led the round announced on 13 May 2026; Anduril said revenue had more than doubled to $2.2 billion in 2025.

31. 2026Anduril

    CCA production contract and first Ohio-built Fury

    The Air Force awarded Anduril and General Atomics Increment 1 production contracts in June 2026; the first Ohio-built Fury rolled off the Arsenal-1 line on 27 July 2026.

Acquisitions

Questions about Anduril vs Lockheed Martin