KNDS MX-10 Damocles

KNDS profile

Q: Where can I research KNDS directly?

Go to the primary sources: KNDS (official site) , Loitering munitions — original report . Avoid aggregator summaries when the filing itself is available.

By Jonathan Tauzerus · reviewed against primary sources · updated October 23, 2026.

KNDS is a European defense manufacturer whose French unit supplies the MX-10 Damocles loitering munition to the French Armed Forces, and France's Directorate General of Armaments (DGA) exercised a contract option in October 2026 for more of them.

What KNDS does

KNDS Sells loitering munitions to the French state through DGA contracts, as one product line inside a larger defense business. The MX-10 Damocles is sold under a contract first awarded in July 2024, and France buys more by exercising options on that contract.

KNDS France owns the Mataris design and builds the MX-10 airframe with Delair, a commercial drone maker in Toulouse, so part of its production capacity depends on that partner. The French government funded early development through a 2022 innovation program, which shows the product began as a state-backed effort before it became a procurement line.

The product lines that define the company for research purposes:

MX-10 Damocles
Mataris unmanned aerial systems family
French Armed Forces short-range remotely operated munition initiative

This profile is qualitative by design. It carries no share price, no price target, no valuation multiple, and no rating — those change faster than any page can honestly track, and the filings linked below are the authoritative source for them.

KNDS drone lineup

The current public product record does not identify a complete aircraft lineup.

No complete-aircraft offering is catalogued for this company; it is tracked here as an unmanned-systems enabler.

Statuses are editorial classifications from the company’s current public catalog: active means currently presented for sale, delivery, or program work; development means publicly disclosed but not a mature production offering; legacy means retained for historical or installed-fleet coverage.

Recent contracts & awards

A dated log of the specific contracts, orders, funding, and deployments reported for KNDS, each tied to its primary source. This is a record of what was announced — a "selection", "award", or "partnership" is not the same as obligated money, so read each source before treating a figure as revenue. No figure appears here unless a source reported it.

OrderOct 16, 2026
France's DGA exercises contract option with KNDS France for additional MX-10 Damocles loitering munitions
The Defense Post reported on Oct. 16, 2026 that France's Directorate General of Armaments (DGA) exercised an option on its contract with KNDS France for more MX-10 Damocles quadcopter loitering munitions for the French Army and Navy, building on an initial July 2024 award; cost, quantity, and delivery timeline were not disclosed.
Researchers should confirm the option exercise and any figures through an official DGA or KNDS release, since the article cites unnamed sources and its prior-delivery details (460 units expected by July 2026) are unclear.
Loitering munitions — original report

Is KNDS going public?

KNDS is privately held and has no listed ticker, so there are no exchange filings or share data to track. Follow KNDS press releases and DGA announcements for company and contract news. Any move to list would appear first in an official company announcement and the filings of the chosen exchange.

Where KNDS sits in the value chain

KNDS is a defense contractor whose unmanned work sits inside a wider defense portfolio, so drone headlines are only one input into results and can be offset — in both directions — by unrelated segments.

Its disclosed activity spans aerial drones. That placement is the single most useful thing to fix in your head before reading any coverage, because the same headline means different things at different layers: a large platform award is transformative for a pure-play, material but diluted for a diversified contractor, and only indirectly relevant to a component supplier whose exposure arrives later as build-rate demand.

Retail coverage routinely applies one story to all three layers at once. For the layer-by-layer comparison across the sector, see the drone stocks research shortlist and the list of publicly traded drone companies.

What to watch

The signals worth tracking are structural, not price-based — they tell you whether the business is changing shape, which is what eventually shows up in the numbers.

Disclosure of the October 2026 option terms. The DGA has not published the cost, quantity, or timeline, so any later disclosure would show the size of this order.
Delivery pace against the 460 platforms that The Defense Post, citing sources, reports were expected by July 2026. Any statement on actual deliveries to the Joint Munitions Service would show whether production met that figure.
The KNDS France and Delair production arrangement. The DGA said the order aims to expand manufacturing capacity, so changes in assembly volume or partner roles affect how fast the MX-10 can be supplied.
Buyers beyond France. The source covers only the French Army and Navy, so a first announced customer outside France would mark a change in the MX-10's market.

How to research KNDS

Every question below has one authoritative source, and using the wrong source is how most retail research goes wrong.

Research question	Where the answer lives	What to look for
Is there anything to buy?	SEC EDGAR full-text search	Whether any registration statement exists at all — absent one, there is no public security.
Is the government work real?	Official DoD contract announcements	Awarding service and scope of work, rather than a company-issued announcement.
What is the acquisition pathway?	DIU and DARPA program pages	Whether the work runs through non-traditional agreements or a conventional program of record.
How would exposure even work?	Fund holdings disclosures	Whether any listed vehicle discloses a stake — indirect exposure is usually thin and unstated.

The Defense Post report on the October 2026 option (The Defense Post) is the grounding source. It covers the July 2024 initial award, the reported 460-platform expectation, the 550-gram warhead, the 10-kilometer range, and the 40-minute endurance. It states that cost, quantity, and timeline were not disclosed.
The French Directorate General of Armaments (DGA) is the contracting authority. Its press releases are the primary record for award dates and any contract values France chooses to publish.
KNDS's own site (KNDS) is the primary source for the Mataris product family, MX-10 specifications, and company announcements. Compare its spec figures against the press report before relying on either.
Delair's site (Delair) is the place to check what the partner says about its role in MX-10 airframe assembly and production capacity.

One failure mode is worth naming explicitly: a company announcement describing a "selection", "award", or "partnership" is not the same as obligated money, and the two are easy to conflate because they use the same vocabulary. Check the official record before treating either as revenue. Our full approach is documented on the methodology page.

KNDS FAQ

What does KNDS do?

KNDS Sells loitering munitions to the French state through DGA contracts, as one product line inside a larger defense business.

Is KNDS publicly traded?

KNDS is not publicly traded, so there is no ticker to buy. Any claim otherwise should be verified against SEC EDGAR before it is believed.

What should investors watch with KNDS?

Disclosure of the October 2026 option terms. The DGA has not published the cost, quantity, or timeline, so any later disclosure would show the size of this order.

Where can I research KNDS directly?

Go to the primary sources: KNDS (official site), Loitering munitions — original report. Avoid aggregator summaries when the filing itself is available.