SOF Week 2026: US Army to conduct trials with Mountain Horse’s containerised drone launcher
Mountain Horse CADDS at SOF Week 2026. (Photo: author)
The Mountain Horse Containerised Autonomous Drone Delivery System has been engineered for dispersed, forward UAV operations. It can store, protect, charge, launch and recover drones.
Mountain Horse, a Global Ordnance subsidiary, has revealed it will conduct demonstrations of its Containerised Autonomous Drone Delivery System (CADDS) for US Army organisations in the coming months. According to the vendor, the solution has been designed to be platform-agnostic and can store, protect, charge, launch and recover uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Speaking to Shephard, Rick Budniewski, director of the UAS/CUAS (counter-UAS) programme at Mountain Horse Solutions, explained that the system is self-powered and can operate semi- or fully autonomously.
“You can have this on any vehicle, system and platform you want,” he said. “You can leave it out in whatever operational environment and, with a simple command, it will launch these drones remotely from wherever the operator is.”
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The company is showcasing the capability at the SOF Week 2026 exhibition in Tampa, Florida. The system is on display with Draganfly drones at the Westin Waterside of the Tampa Convention Centre. CADDS is open, without its lead on, to allow visitors to visualise its interior.
Mountain Horse’s CADDS has been engineered to endure extreme climate conditions and enable drone operations in diverse theatres, according to the company.
“It could be deployed in almost any environment. It will come with its own battery system and it will have solar panels to constantly keep everything charged,” Budniewski stated. “For operational deployments, it will be completely closed and, when needed, it will open up and then the drones will launch.”
CADDS architecture also enables it to be tailored according to the user requirements and the type of scenario it will be used in.
“We know that not everything is one size fits all. Mountain Horse is an integrator and works with a lot of partners to come up with the solutions to the promise sets that our US service members are expressing,” Budniewski explained.
Wider initiatives show growing trend
The demand for this type of product has been growing across the Pentagon and its services and agencies. The US Army, for instance, has been pursuing similar options for dispersed operations as part of the Joint Tactical Autonomous Aerial Resupply Systems (JTAARS) initiative. This effort aims to autonomously deliver supplies to forward units while reducing convoy exposure and manpower requirements.
Meanwhile, the Defence Innovation Unit (DIU) issued a Commercial Solutions Opening in February seeking industry proposals for autonomous, containerised systems capable of storing, launching, recovering and refitting drones with minimal human involvement.
The Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), in turn, published requests for information in April for transportable containers for Group 1-3 drones.
The agency envisioned systems support in swarm warfare, GPS-denied operations, expeditionary logistics and persistent ISR/strike missions.
Related Programmes in Defence Insight
Containerized Autonomous Drone Delivery System (CADDS) (Group 1-3) [US]
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