The war in Ukraine has shown that warfare changes by the day. It is also painfully clear that the technology used to wage war today is expensive: While larger countries can afford legions of tanks, helicopters, and precision-strike systems, smaller countries must scrounge about for cheaper means to defend themselves.

Origin is a new defense technology startup from Latvia, with reusable, autonomous drones capable of delivering munitions at a significantly lower cost than similar alternatives. It already has commercial agreements in place with two NATO countries, though those two remain undisclosed for security reasons.

Founded in 2022 by Agris Kipurs and Ilya Nevdah, Origin issued after the two left Airdog, the company that developed the autonomously flying drone that is famously used for recording extreme sports. Eventually, Airdog was acquired by U.S. smart home solutions developer Alarm.com.
"Airdog was a consumer drone. We were the first in the world to launch an autonomously flying system in 2015," Kipurs (CEO) told TechCrunch.  "We founded Origin in March of 2022, obviously in response to the invasion of Ukraine. We realized we had to get back to doing what we do best, this time for military applications. We knew that the skill set we have as a team is rare, as we had been building autonomous systems for 10+ years."

BEAK ISR drone is BEAK's flagship product, boasting with precision guidance technology. It mounts a camera and is capable of autonomous flight and can survive intense radio jamming. It is man-portable and is good for wars like the one in Ukraine.

Today we're all used to the vision of 'first-person view' (FPV) drones with grenades strapped to them, crashing into a tank to blow it up. Obviously, such drones need to be replaced.

Instead of detonating itself, the BEAK delivers its ordnance to the target while staying intact and thus reusable-that can save considerable expense.

"The BEAK is a precision-guided weapons system," Kipurs explained. "It's not a drone. Think of it as a flying Javelin. Drones are typically used for reconnaissance-type applications, not for delivering precision strikes. This is more like a traditional military drone, only it's small, with the cost per strike approximately 20 times lower than the alternatives."

Kipurs expects the BEAK will attract the smaller countries: "Latvia and every small democracy across the world desperately needs the tech community to get behind the mission. They realize that they can no longer afford warfare the old-fashioned way."

Origin recently raised an early-stage funding of €2.4 million led by Change Ventures and in addition, investment also came from Silicon Roundabout Ventures. The funding was topped up by EU grants and support from the Latvian Ministry of Defence to €1.6 million, making the total amount of funding available stand at €4 million.

Andris K. Berzins, a partner at Change Ventures, added: "Having known Agris and Ilya for a decade through their successful launch of the world's leading action sports drone Airdog, I knew this team is unlike the many that have started learning how to build a drone startup only since the Ukraine invasion two years ago.". Their ability to combine expertise with such an ambitious vision of reshaping the precision weapon market and the remarkable traction established within the last 18 months made Origin an easy bet.