Brandon Tseng, co-founder of Shield AI, said there are common misconceptions about drones powered by the company’s signature software. People say drones need to be armed.
But experienced militaries working together using Shield AI know that modern warfare doesn’t require that capability, Tseng told Business Insider.
“Who doesn’t want that? The U.S. military doesn’t want that, because we understand joint fire, and the Ukrainians don’t want that anymore,” said the former Navy SEAL, president of Shield AI.
V-BAT is a vertical takeoff and landing drone that uses artificial intelligence to fly in crowded environments and has been used primarily for intelligence and reconnaissance missions in high-profile conflict zones such as Ukraine. Shield AI said V-BAT flew more than 200 missions there in 2025.
Drones still serve as multi-mission platforms, Tseng said, and Shield AI is exploring ways to equip them with weapons. Last month, the company announced a partnership with South Korean weapons manufacturer LIG Nex1 to equip the V-BAT with a 6-pound guided missile.
“But at the end of the day, look, I describe V-BAT as a small predator, a reaper drone,” Tseng said. “That’s its job: finding the target. And finding the target is difficult. You have to stay there for a long time.”
V-Bat is primarily used for ISR missions, but there is also an option to equip AI-equipped drones with weapons. Kim Hongji/Reuters
To be fair, the MQ-9 Reaper is also commonly equipped with missiles.
But Tseng said sophisticated militaries already have a vast array of other weapons that can turn V-BAT information into precision strikes.
“If the U.S. allies who fought closely with us in Afghanistan have been in these combat zones, they don’t call for organic fire onboard the V-Bat,” Tseng said. “Because everyone is used to saying, ‘Okay, I have a targeting package. What are the fire assets that I’m lining up? Is it a one-way attack drone? Is it a HIMARS? Is it an artillery gun? Is it an SM-6? Is it an SM-3?’
“It doesn’t matter. We’ll find the weapon,” he added. “Weapons are available. We actually need more intelligence.”
Initial use of V-BAT in Ukraine
When V-BAT started finding Ukrainian targets in early 2024, this was a framework that Ukraine still needed to improve, Tseng said. The drone is intended to fly for more than 13 hours and is easy to deploy as it requires two launch staff and no runway.
Tseng said that while Ukraine excels at tactical drone warfare, the country’s military was not used to having long-range assets capable of finding targets for regular strategic strikes like the U.S. military.
“Strategic effects will occur, but they will be rare,” he says. “Those are very carefully planned operations, very expensive operations, like sending quadcopters deep into Russia in trucks and going to Russian airstrips.”
Tseng said Ukrainian drone teams would use V-BAT to locate high-value targets, such as Russian S-300 and S-400 air defense systems, but would find they were not aligned with the right team to attack them.
“We said, ‘Why didn’t you guys align these weapons?’ They would say, ‘Well, we weren’t going to coordinate,'” Tseng says.
Since then, Kiev’s military has used information from V-BAT to carry out attacks with one-way attack drones and systems such as the US-made HIMARS, Tseng said.
“This past year has been a lot of learning for Ukrainians,” he added.
