chance – Our Story Insight

Iran war is defense tech’s chance to shine, but few systems are ready

admin — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 14:30:58 +0000

Guvendemir | E+ | Getty Images

The Iran war is redefining modern combat for the U.S. and driving demand for lower-cost tech.

It’s the exact situation Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth warned against a few months ago.

“We cannot afford to shoot down cheap drones with $2 million missiles,” Hegseth said in December. “And we ourselves must be able to field large quantities of capable attack drones.”

Two days into the war, the U.S. used up a reported $5.6 billion in munitions. Meanwhile, Iran has wreaked havoc on military bases, tourist centers and data centers used by America’s largest tech giants with swarms of low-cost Shahed drones that cost between $20,000 and $50,000, according to public estimates.

This is the moment defense tech and Silicon Valley have been waiting for.

For years, defense tech has fought to prove itself in Washington and grab a chunk of the ballooning Pentagon budget snatched up by defense primes like Lockheed Martin, RTX and Northrop Grumman.

The war, coupled with President Donald Trump’s military reindustrialization efforts, could offer that long-awaited catalyst.

“The world is more dangerous,” said Mike Brown, partner at Shield Capital. “Technologies that were on the drawing board a decade ago have now proven themselves on the battlefield.”

Proving ground for drone tech

The U.S. has deployed its own version of the Shahed in Iran called the Low-cost Uncrewed Combat Attack System, or LUCAS. The drone, built by Arizona-based SpektreWorks, costs about $35,000 per unit according to industry estimates.

The Department of Defense is also reportedly in the market to buy more.

Tara Murphy Dougherty, CEO of defense software startup Govini, said LUCAS is one of the only major new systems emerging in the Iran war, but production is modest. Most U.S. air capabilities in Iran have been with traditional fighter jets and bombers.

In counter-drone tech, Aerovironment this week announced the Locust X3 laser system, which the company claims will cost under $5 a shot. Contractors Lockheed Martin, RTX and Leidos also offer solutions.

Taser maker Axon entered the sector in 2024 with its Dedrone acquisition. Startups Anduril and Epirus are also scaling counter-drone warfare capabilities.

Despite their real-world applications, these tools accounted for only $4.7 billion of the fiscal 2026 budget. That’s according to data from Obviant, an intelligence startup that focuses on defense acquisition, contracting and budgeting data.

“America was built on competition, so let’s be competitive,” said Brett Velicovich, co-founder of Powerus, a drone company backed by Trump’s sons. “Let the companies that have the best technology win, because it’s only beneficial to our country.”

Major defense tech winners so far include Oculus-creator Palmer Luckey’s Anduril and software AI company Palantir. Both recently signed multibillion-dollar-ceiling contracts with the Pentagon.

Palantir’s tools are already deeply ingrained in the DOD, and CEO Alex Karp alluded to the fact that the U.S. and its Middle East allies are using the company’s Maven platform.

The sector has seen a surge in popularity in Silicon Valley, with deal value nearly doubling to $49.9 billion last year from $27.3 billion in 2024, according to Pitchbook data.

Despite that excitement, spending on the sector accounted for less than 1% of contract dollars in 2025, according to data from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute. Anduril, Palantir and Elon Musk’s SpaceX account for 88% of that.

Anduril flies its unmanned drone YFQ-44A for the first time at an unspecified location in California, Oct. 31, 2025, in this handout image.

Anduril | Via Reuters

Reindustrializing the military

The push to advance the military’s tech capabilities began well before the war in Iran, and Trump stepped up efforts to rebuild aging military systems early in his first term with a series of executive orders.

Trump’s signature $185 billion “Golden Dome” missile defense system will also provide new opportunities for startups, including shipbuilding and drone companies.

Several defense tech startups CNBC spoke with for this story said demand has skyrocketed from DOD customers since the U.S. and Israel first struck Iran at the end of February. Many of those customers have offered to buy out capacity or asked firms to ramp production, the businesses said.

“We’ve had very clear demand signals coming out of this administration and the Pentagon,” said Ryan Tseng, president and co-founder of Shield AI, which hit a $12.7 billion valuation this week. “People are more ready than they ever have been.”

Gauging demand is a difficult task for any business, but particularly critical for firms reliant on venture funding to keep factories running. At the same time, the government hasn’t offered a steady enough flow of contracts to rationalize scaling for some of these businesses.

That’s leaving defense tech firms divided over whether to hike capacity to win deals and risk profitability, or hold off and potentially miss opportunities.

John Tenet, CEO of radar maker Chaos Industries, said his manufacturing team is building day and night to meet customer demand signals. The company recently raised $510 million at a $4.5 billion valuation.

“If you’re waiting for the contract to scale production, you’re already too late,” he said.

Many of these businesses are already operating at a faster clip than in previous years.

One counter-drone startup, which asked not to be named due to the nature of the company’s work with the government, told CNBC that this year it’s on track to double the number of systems created since it first launched its tool.

The startup said that all those systems have been sold to customers, and it would only increase capacity if given a contract by the U.S. government.

That’s the tricky part of working with the government.

Chaos Industries’ Vanquish Prime radar system.

Courtesy: Brett Cummings | Chaos Industries

Demand appears insatiable, but some defense firms told CNBC that they want contracts before shelling out on new systems. That’s even more critical for businesses building multi-million dollar tools with intricate supply chains.

Businesses could stockpile to get ahead of demand, but rapid innovation could quickly outpace their tech. That’s why focusing on a single product is a “very dangerous game,” said Accel partner Ben Quazzo.

“If you wake up one day and that’s obsolete, your business is in trouble,” Quazzo said.

The Pentagon plans to funnel billions over the next few years into defense technology, with Trump calling for a $1.5 trillion military budget in 2027. However, a budget managed by Congress with limited long-term visibility, coupled with a slow contracting process hindered by bureaucracy, creates some roadblocks.

“The Pentagon is the only company in the globe that is bound up by procurement and sales rules that somebody else is writing,” said Morgan Plummer, vice president of policy design and delivery at Americans for Responsible Innovation.

Even as tech companies ramp up production, experts said few of these tools are actually reaching battlefields abroad, and the production scale is far too low to cause a significant impact.

Hegseth’s acknowledgment of the drone-missile cost disparity came with a call for the industry to build 300,000 drones “quickly and inexpensively.”

The effort would deliver “hundreds of thousands of them by 2027,” Hegseth said.

Weeks after the first phase of the program started, the Iran war began.

Choose CNBC as your preferred source on Google and never miss a moment from the most trusted name in business news.

The post Iran war is defense tech’s chance to shine, but few systems are ready appeared first on Our Story Insight.

Lunar New Year gives brands a chance to win back big spenders in China

admin — Sat, 14 Feb 2026 23:15:35 +0000

Luxury brands from Harry Winston to Loewe are going all in on Lunar New Year collections in a bid to attract Chinese customers.

Ahead of the Year of the Horse, which starts on Tuesday, Harry Winston unveiled a limited-edition, $81,500 rose gold watch with diamond bezels and a red lacquer horse. High-end fashion brand Chloé released a capsule collection, ranging from $250 silk scarves to a $5,300 snakeskin and leather shoulder bag with a horse head and tail linked by a horsebit chain. A slew of other brands, including Loewe, Gucci and Loro Piana, have introduced new bag charms with horse motifs.

The Year of the Horse arrives at a time of cautious optimism for designer brands and could mark the start of a China’s luxury market comeback.

Chinese consumers were once the primary driver for the global luxury sector but have cut back sharply in recent years, weighed down by the country’s slowing economy and depressed housing values.

The Chinese luxury market stood at about 350 billion RMB in 2024, or about $50 billion, according to estimates from Bain. While the consultancy estimates that market contracted by 3% to 5% in 2025, Bain analysts noted that the sector started showing signs of recovery in the second half of 2025 on the back of stronger stock market performance and consumer confidence.

Loewe celebrated Year of the Horse with storefront installation in Shanghai, China.

Ying Tang/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Bernstein senior analyst Luca Solca said he predicts Chinese luxury spending will stabilize, forecasting mid-single-digit percentage growth in 2026. However, the market is still far more competitive than at its peak, he said.

Before the Covid pandemic, Chinese consumers accounted for about one-third of the global luxury goods market, according to Solca. That percentage has since dipped to about 23%, he said.

The luxury market’s fortunes do not solely rest on Lunar New Year, but it is an opportunity for Western brands to show respect for Chinese culture, he said.

The annual holiday is associated with the colors red and gold, which symbolize good luck and fortune in Chinese culture. Each Lunar New Year is represented by one of 12 Chinese zodiac animals. Last year’s animal was the snake.

Get Inside Wealth directly to your inbox

But Solca said in order to best capture the Chinese luxury consumer, brands need to go beyond the expected motifs.

“The Chinese are no longer in awe of anything that comes from the West,” Solca said. “A perfunctory interpretation of CNY is not going to go far.”

Veronique Yang, who leads BCG’s consumer practice in Greater China, said literal interpretations can come across as lazy or even disrespectful to Chinese consumers. Younger shoppers are also looking for fresher takes, she said.

“Chinese young people, they respect the old Chinese culture, but to be honest, a lot of parts of it they don’t understand, or they want it to be reinterpreted in a modern way,” she said. “It’s important to weave a narrative that connects the heritage with a contemporary vision.”

Lunar New Year collections date back to the early 2010s, as Western brands were eager to tap into the rapidly growing Chinese luxury consumer market, according to Daniel Langer, professor of luxury strategy at Pepperdine University. At the time, newly wealthy Chinese consumers were eager to spend on designer goods, especially when they traveled abroad, he said, as there were few luxury boutiques in China outside major cities like Shanghai and Beijing.

Now, with broader access and more choice, brands have to work harder to bring in new clients.

And in the 12 years since the last Year of the Horse, Chinese high-income consumers have become more discerning, Langer said.

“They’ve been to the best places in the world. They’ve dined in the best restaurants in the world. They’ve shopped in the best shops in the world. Their expectations towards brands are significantly higher,” he said. “China has completely changed from a country where there was pent up demand for luxury goods to a country of the highest sophistication.”

Burberry’s Lunar New Year products.

Courtesy of Burberry

They also have grown accustomed to spending less on Western brands between pandemic travel restrictions and the rise of domestic high-end labels, according to Langer.

Before the pandemic, Chinese consumers did most of their luxury shopping abroad. Pandemic travel restrictions permanently changed that dynamic. According to Bain, two-thirds of Chinese luxury goods spending was done abroad in 2019. Last year, overseas spending made up only a third.

The Year of the Horse provides a natural opportunity for a sizable number of Western brands to connect to the holiday. Langer said he preferred brands who take a less literal approach, such as Loewe, which adorned its signature Puzzle bags with fringes and tassels for a cowboy aesthetic.

Yang noted, however, that the year’s zodiac animal is a good luck symbol only for people who were born in that year, which makes playing too much into horse imagery a risk.

Instead, she said, brands can use immersive experiences to connect to Chinese customers, especially younger ones, in a more authentic way.

Valentino, for instance, held a three-day lantern festival in January at Tianhou Palace, a historic temple along the Suzhou Creek in Shanghai. Burberry launched an extensive Lunar New Year campaign in mid-December, with Chinese brand ambassadors and a pop-up boutique and ice rink in Beijing.

“There’s a lot of different cultural elements that you can integrate and build a narrative around,” Yang said. “It’s not only about animals.”

The post Lunar New Year gives brands a chance to win back big spenders in China appeared first on Our Story Insight.

A chance for peace in the Middle East and the U.S.-China trade war

admin — Tue, 14 Oct 2025 11:04:41 +0000

U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he poses next to a sign before a family photo at a world leaders’ summit on ending the Gaza war, amid a U.S.-brokered prisoner-hostage swap and ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, Oct. 13, 2025.

Suzanne Plunkett | Reuters

This might not be Christmas, but the war in the Middle East is over — at least according to U.S. President Donald Trump.

On Monday, Trump declared at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, that the “long and painful nightmare” was finally over for both the Israelis and Palestinians. More straightforwardly, Trump gave an unequivocal “yes” when asked by reporters if the war in the Middle East has ended, Reuters reported.

A similarly hopeful mood permeated markets, though for different reasons. After hitting China with 100% additional tariffs and triggering a sell-off on Friday, Trump appeared to walk back his stance, posting on Truth Social that “it will all be fine” with China.

And thus was TACO back on traders’ menus: Major U.S. stock indexes rebounded, with technology stocks leading the charge. Quantum computing names popped after JPMorgan Chase announced it will be investing $10 billion in sectors crucial to national interests.

Broadcom, meanwhile, surged almost 10% after it jointly announced a partnership with — who else? — OpenAI to build and deploy custom chips. But where this puts Nvidia, OpenAI’s other near and dear one, and on whose chips the ChatGPT maker relies, remains a question.

Though Christmas has yet to arrive, OpenAI is starting to look like the tech sector’s Santa Claus, who has his sack full of presents — and, more importantly, cash, according to Oracle.

— CNBC’s Holly Ellyatt contributed to this report.

What you need to know today

And finally…

U.S. President Donald Trump shakes hands with Argentina’s President Javier Milei during the 80th United Nations General Assembly, in New York City, New York, U.S., Sept. 23, 2025.

Alexander Drago | Reuters

The U.S. has stepped in with an extraordinary bailout of Argentina. Here’s what it means

In a move that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced Thursday on social media site X, the U.S. is providing a $20 billion currency swap line with Argentina’s central bank — essentially exchanging stable U.S. dollars with volatile pesos.

The move comes amid liquidity concerns in Argentina that threatened stability for the country as it faces key midterm elections. There are equal parts economic and political stakes with the venture, which marks the first U.S. intervention of this nature since rescuing Mexico in 1995.

— Jeff Cox

Correction: This story has been updated to reflect that Tata Group’s Titan Engineering and Automation acquired Justech’s India unit. The previous version misstated the acquiror’s name.

The post A chance for peace in the Middle East and the U.S.-China trade war appeared first on Our Story Insight.