To the Day 1 of the Sidoti Small Cap Conference. My name is Aashi Shah, and I'm an analyst here at Sidoti. With me today, I have Ondas Holdings Inc. It trades under the ticker ONDS. I'm happy to welcome Eric Brock, CEO of the company. We have about 30 minutes today, including the Q&A. If you have any questions, please submit them at the Q&A section at the bottom of your screen. With that, I will let you take over, Eric.
All right, thank you. To get started, I just want to start by thanking Sidoti for including Ondas in this event. We've got two days of meetings scheduled and 18 investors, so I'm really happy with the turnout. Had some good dialogues already. Again, thank you. We just have about 30 minutes, so I want to jump right into it. What I do plan to do today is firstly start with an overview, introduce Ondas and our business units. I want to highlight our technology platforms and the value we're bringing to the markets. Of course, I'll be touching on our customer activity and the operational plan to support what we see as rapid growth in the years ahead. Then I'll touch on our outlook and priorities.
I'm going to try to do all of this in 20 minutes or so and then leave time for Q&A. There's a lot to cover, and I'm going to try to move quickly. Let's do that. Of course, please review our disclaimer on forward-looking statements. Let me start with an overview of Ondas Holdings. We have two business units. There's Ondas Networks and Ondas Autonomous Systems. What we're doing is providing mission-critical data solutions to large defense, industrial, and government customers. At Ondas Networks, we're providing a connectivity platform which is enabling private wireless networks, in fact, upgrades of private wireless networks for critical markets like utilities, oil and gas, and rail, of course. I'm going to focus on railroads, where we're seeing a massive upgrade cycle for actually multiple networks, starting with the 900 megahertz network.
Essentially, what we're doing is providing a data pipe at the edge of the train operations where the railroad operators and their vendors, so big vendors like Siemens, who we have a partnership with, and by the way, there's other large vendors that we're engaging with at the edge as well for critical railroad technologies. They want to drive intelligence. What does that mean? There's automation tools, there's sensor networks, there's edge computing capabilities at the wayside along the tracks, on locomotives, at rail crossings. There's restrictions. The restrictions are the legacy network, which is only taking kilobits or offering kilobits of data capacity, can't handle these new capabilities. Of course, to drive all the efficiencies, to run trains faster with more autonomy, and to adopt these safety applications, which increasingly are being required by regulators, that's the bottleneck. We have a software-defined network.
It's a capability where we have created the critical IP for an IEEE standard called 802.16. We really evolved that and architected it actually specifically for these rail applications. We brand it as .16. Again, we're taking that to the market with folks like Siemens and some new partners that we're engaging. If I talk about OAS now and introduce that business unit, our drone or autonomous systems business unit, what we're doing there is providing aerial security and intelligence. We are doing that via autonomous drone platforms. We have two platforms. There's Optimus. Of course, then there's the Iron Drone Raider. I'll share a lot more about those for the bulk of this call, actually. We're going to really dig in deep on their capabilities and the markets we're addressing.
I want to highlight they are mature and they're addressing some really, really significant markets in terms of size and value. Essentially, what we're doing with the intelligence aspect is we're fusing the payload capabilities, the inspection use case with AI-enabled machine learning type of analytics. We deploy these drone platforms as drone infrastructure, so they're autonomous drone infrastructure. Again, they're providing operating intelligence, which is allowing us, on behalf of our customers, to protect and secure critical locations. We go to market as OAS under the American Robotics and Airobotics banners. At Airobotics, as you know, that's the primary product development group we have inside the company. They're also a drone service provider taking these two autonomous platforms to what we call the reservoir markets, whereas American Robotics is a drone service provider taking these capabilities to the large U.S. markets.
I want to emphasize that these technology platforms across Ondas Networks and OAS are proprietary. They are platform technologies. Again, they're targeting extremely large, high-value markets across defense, industrial, and critical infrastructure, as well as government markets. We see significant demand tailwinds for all these platforms. As a company, Ondas is in transition. We are moving from multi-year development cycles where we're enhancing and perfecting and commercializing and hardening products and introducing the customers to adoption cycles. I firmly believe we're going to be seeing S curves ahead. In fact, I think we've already seen them in certain spots, particularly on OAS. Both of these business units are creating incredible value for customers and partners. We believe we're going to realize that value for investors. Some context, we've invested over $300 million in developing the IP and end markets.
I want to make a very important point. We have de-risked the technology. Okay? You're not investing here in Ondas in the technology development firm. We are an operating company and now looking to scale in these attractive end markets with a really aggressive growth plan. For the rest of the conversation, I want to focus our attention on our drone businesses. That's, of course, where we're seeing the initial significant revenue ramp and adoption curve. I do want to highlight, however, that Ondas Networks has a ton of value. Of course, we have seen timelines extend with the railroads. Both of these business units are going to be incredibly successful. The potential is for them to both become very, very large. We will spend more time today highlighting the drone businesses. At OAS, we have a portfolio of best-in-class dual-use autonomous platforms.
Again, they're deployed for aerial security and intelligence, typically protecting critical assets, locations, and populations. The Optimus system, which you see here on the left, is a "drone in a box." This is a docking station. Of course, it's a lot more than a box. We'll talk a lot more about the capabilities in a bit. You'll see this system deployed as infrastructure, providing perimeter security, emergency response capabilities, inspection. This is at military bases, at borders. It's also, as you can see, with the Dubai Police and our network. We're deploying a smart drone network for public safety and homeland security. This is a so-called DFR, drone as first responder use case. The Iron Drone Raider on the right is positioned as a best-in-class hard kill counter-drone platform. With the Iron Drone system, we are mitigating the threat of hostile drones by capturing the drone with a net.
This is built for purpose in a very unique way. As we talk about our customers, you'll learn that we have the privilege to work really closely with the IDF, specifically with a group called MAFAT to help architect their solutions in and around the lower skies protection. As it relates to counter-drone technologies, we are seeing a surge in demand for systems and capabilities like the Iron Drone. The threat of hostile drones has, as we are all well aware, increased dramatically over the last 12, 18, 24 months, and it's becoming a massive security issue. This is not just true in terms of being a security issue if you're a commander of a military. It's true if you're protecting critical assets and locations ranging from ports or refineries to data centers or even NFL stadiums or amusement parks like a Disney World.
All of those security officials need to concern and be concerned in addressing the threat from hostile drones. We're going to go into this in some more detail, but I want to see, hopefully, this is going to work. All right, thank you. I won't belabor this. I've talked quite a bit about the end markets we're targeting, but I do want to highlight that these are dual use. Of course, that means the TAMs we're targeting are very large. We are seeing a huge inflection in demand in both defense and homeland security markets. Now we're also seeing a similar surge in demand in public safety markets, the DFR type of drone as first responder use case that we're really leading the way globally with our partners in Dubai. What we're essentially seeing in terms of the demand environment is maturing technology.
This is really important. The end market's always been there. It's always been massive. We're now being able to meet that demand with technology that's mature, proven, and scalable. Of course, that's mapping itself to regulations, which are, of course, strengthening in parallel with the technical capability. There's huge pent-up demand, in my opinion, and strong ROI from these technology platforms. I think we're entering a multi-year, probably a 10-year-plus growth cycle in investment cycle in and around these capabilities. I touched on a bunch of this. We've talked about the markets we're addressing, the dual use, the size and significance, and the capabilities of Optimus and Iron Drone. I want to highlight that we did announce earlier this year in January that we have what was likely to become a third platform. I want to put this on your radar screen.
That is, of course, the expansion of Iron Drone. This is a modular system and upgradable. We can carry payloads other than nets, of course. What I'm saying is we can make this more kinetic. Of course, that has additional capabilities. We do that beyond just security. This can be a very important tool for our customers. I do want to highlight that the growth curve and adoption is kicking in. I'll particularly highlight in the second half of 2024, we secured over $15 million in orders led by the programs of record with a major military customer in the Middle East. We see significant upside for program expansion in 2025 and 2026 and beyond with this customer. I expect really a multi-year program to expand and install Optimus and Iron Drone as infrastructure for critical locations in Israel.
We have a strong relationship with that customer. As I highlighted on our investor calls, we're being supported by government-to-government marketing with allied militaries. I think we communicated in our conference call last week that we expect at least two major militaries to engage on Iron Drone. The program expansion and these new customers are very visible in terms of timelines for us. In addition, we're spending a lot of time and energy to "operationalize" the company and support customer demand and deliveries. Of course, that means building out our supply chain and production capabilities and field services and sustainment to support expansion. That operational build-out is including the United States. I did announce, or we did announce the beginning of last week, a partnership with Palantir. I'm going to touch on that in a little more detail in just a minute.
On the financial side, I highlight that we have a strong cash balance. We raised $30 million in the fourth quarter, and actually $35 million. We started the year with $30 million in the bank. We do expect to see record revenue in 2025. That's for $25 million. It was our current expectation, which is over three and a half times growth from 2024. I want to emphasize that these revenue targets are very visible and we believe conservative. I do believe that our high growth rates will be sustained for quite some time with the tailwinds we see, not just in the drone sector, but specifically for capabilities like we have. As I mentioned, adoption is accelerating. I want to highlight the programs of record we've received from our major military customer in the Middle East. We are the direct vendor here.
These are our programs, and they are for both Optimus and Iron Drone. We are providing these systems as a turnkey solution. What that means is we have pricing and field support and sustainment activities already established. That will make this program of record all that much more expandable in 2025 and beyond. Optimus is being deployed to protect bases and borders. Iron Drone, of course, is similar critical locations. Of course, I mentioned the G2G sales. I want to highlight here that we talk about TAMs. I also talk about what we call the serviceable and obtainable market, or SOM. What we sized out with customers, the customer here is at least $120 million in obtainable market. We do think there's quite some scope here for near-term program expansion. That's going to be material. I want to highlight some other marquee customers.
Of course, we are deploying Optimus for perimeter security, emergency response, and inspection. We've got the Dubai Police who have arguably, or I would believe without a doubt, actually the most advanced and sophisticated drone as a first responder or DFR program in the world. We've deployed eight systems, and the customer here continues to publicly target at least 22 systems for citywide coverage. All of this drone infrastructure in Dubai is being operated from a central remote operating center. Now we're three years into this program, which has been incredibly successful. We have also deployed Optimus, and this is a great example of a use case with multiple customers, essentially, to protect and secure commercial assets. In this case, what we're showing here is a semiconductor customer of ours who are operating and expanding a large semiconductor fabrication facility.
We've been there for eight years, six years with the same system, providing drone as a service and, of course, intelligence as a service. This is being what that entails is both perimeter security and safety as well as inspection. For a use case like this, our customer is able to secure their perimeter and also keep their projects on track and on budget. As I said earlier, we're very focused on creating that scalable operating platform. That includes the supply chain, the field services, and sustainment activities. We're doing this globally. That is starting, of course, in Israel and the United States. Ultimately, it will be in Europe where customers are. We do have a partnership to support this and more. What we announced a little over a week ago is we have multi-fold optionality.
We're initially adopting the Foundry AI system with Palantir. That is intended, again, to support the scaling of the supply chain and our service delivery model. This relationship will grow. We and Palantir intend to integrate more of Palantir's AI capabilities around autonomy and the data and intelligence capabilities of our systems and their capabilities. This is going to allow us and Palantir to enhance our systems and our offering to key customers and to provide growth in some of the key markets we're both targeting. This development work creates a go-to-market upside for both parties, which I believe is significant. I believe you're going to hear more about that in the coming months and quarters in 2025. I'll skip this in the interest of time. I'm going to spend just a minute here on Iron Drone. Then I'm going to flip probably to Q&A.
It's taking me a little longer. I know that I have a feeling that folks want to ask some specific questions. Again, we're part of a multi-layer security platform. We particularly highlight the capabilities and intelligence around navigation of the Iron Drone system. We have a high-performance drone. When a hostile drone or a threat is detected, the ground radar tells us about where it is. We learn it's coming from the north, 400 feet of altitude, flying at 60 mi an hour. The Iron Drone Raider is activated and goes at hyperspeed to that general vicinity. Mid-flight, the sensors we have on the drone, this is where the really sophisticated intelligence comes. We've got thermal, optical, and micro-radar sensors on the drone, high compute.
We locate the hostile drone in space, and then we track it and hunt it, essentially, and capture it. Then we come back, and we can reuse this drone for ongoing security. Of course, that means it's reusable, which is a huge economic benefit. That is why I'm saying it's built for purpose. Also, the net, as opposed to, say, a missile, other higher collateral impact mitigation strategies is important because, again, you're protecting people who are in locations and assets in and around the areas you're protecting. Let me end here with just, again, reiterating. We came into the year with a strong backlog. I do expect a record year for bookings and, of course, a record year for revenue. With that said, I think I'll turn it to you, Aashi, for some Q&A.
Thank you so much for your time today, Eric. I would like to remind everybody in the audience that if you have any questions, please submit them at the Q&A function at the bottom of your screen. With that, Eric, the Palantir partnership that you just talked about, it is really excellent, and it is a great opportunity. How do you see this partnership evolving over time?
Yeah, great question. Initially, it is that Foundry AI, and that's going to help us apply this scalable production capability and field service, how we engage customers. It's bringing our enterprise resource planning capability together with external data sources to really support what we think is going to be, again, a pretty attractive growth plan. In addition, Palantir has capabilities around autonomy. I'll highlight that both of our drone platforms, both Iron Drone, which I just emphasized a moment ago, but Optimus have been enhanced for ability to navigate without GPS and radio links. This is a very special and critical capability for the high-end value end markets we're servicing. I will say that Palantir has additional capabilities there that we could choose to incorporate. That's just one example. The AI they can bring to the bear is in around system performance.
It's also potentially around enhancing some of the detection technologies that feed our system. Of course, if we integrate those sorts of things, that creates go-to-market opportunities for both of us to sell integrated systems and capabilities to customers. Ultimately, I think that's where it goes. I'll also highlight that a company like Palantir, when we have a drone, the Optimus system that is essentially a sensor collecting various inputs, whether it's the live video, say, a LiDAR image, a thermal sensor image, things of that nature, we can work with Palantir to create solutions that, if we're securing a military base or, say, a border, it creates a lot of value. For customers that Palantir has, they're very similar to the ones we're targeting. There's certainly a lot of scope to play there.
That's how I see the optionality in and around this relationship.
Great. That's really interesting. I think it should be good, and we will look out for that and how it plans out. You mentioned the program of record business. Can you please explain further why it is so important and what you're planning to do over there?
Yeah, sure. The initial program of record we have is with the major military customer in the Middle East. What's particularly important about that is, firstly, we are an emerging technology company. When we're developing these very sophisticated systems that are integrated with other capabilities, it's not typical that the customer will go direct. Oftentimes, you'll see a bias towards the stronger company with broader capabilities, bigger balance sheet, etc., as chooses them to be the integrator. I think specifically, I'll talk about Iron Drone. There's a desire for this customer to keep the Iron Drone platform really clean from an IP standpoint, where Ondas and our Airobotics group can leverage this with many other allied militaries, which means we have the flexibility to work and integrate with technologies, say, with the U.S. DOD or another, say, military in Europe.
That is very, very important when you think about expanding the market and making the Iron Drone, giving this the ability to be a global standard. You need to have that interoperability. The fact that the customer has decided to go direct with us, I think, tells you a lot about what they think about the optionality here or the opportunity for us to build a big market. I'd also add that because we have this program of record or the vendor, that enables us to be eligible for the government programs. We've already seen that we have every reason to believe that they're going to be very effective and additive. I will highlight, however, that we're going to have our own direct marketing capabilities for the defense and homeland security sectors as well. We're going to go down multiple paths.
Right. Do we have any of the Ondas systems currently being used in Ukraine?
Not in Ukraine.
Okay. Right. How is the change in the U.S. government control changing the trajectory of the opportunity in the U.S. and the federal support for the domestic drone industry?
Okay. So yeah, how is policy impacting the drone industry in the U.S. is, I think, what the question is. I say it's hugely positive. There are huge tailwinds for companies like ours. We're kind of in this "defense technology vertical" and providing these autonomous systems. These are capabilities that every military, and particularly the U.S. DOD, really needs to leverage. We have these tailwinds from the demand side, and we've uniquely developed them. I would say that there's a huge shift, firstly, in spending, where these large DOD budgets are tilting towards these capabilities. That's one. Of course, that is a policy. Secondly, you're seeing a very big desire from policymakers to really strengthen the U.S. drone sector. Of course, that's a huge benefit to us as well.
Specifically, you're seeing things around regulations, so-called NDAA type of regulations, National Defense Authorization Act, which is requiring customers to really engage allied or Western, I'll say, companies like Ondas. That's as opposed, of course, to Chinese producers who had an early lead in these sorts of technologies. I think that that's just increasing the tailwind for us. I think it's also driving a massive investment cycle as you're starting to see private capital back companies like Ondas. I really think this is early days. I think over the next 3, 5, 10 years, this industry, starting with this big defense spending impulse, is going to grow a lot. If you can bring capabilities like us to secure not just military assets and borders, but also critical infrastructure and critical industrial assets, the tailwinds are hugely supportive.
Got it. Would you need any additional certificates to be able to get permissions for the autonomous drones?
There are various ways to think about that. If we're particularly in commercial settings, we do need FAA approvals to operate our systems, of course. We've demonstrated our capability there. I will tell you, and this is important, as a validator of the reliability and maturity of the system, the Optimus system is the only one of its kind that has an FAA-type certificate. Again, that's a measure of our capabilities. I will say that when we're going to the U.S. Department of Defense, we will be required to be Blue UAS certified. The requirements to be Blue UAS certified is that your system needs to be NDAA compliant, and you need to have a customer, one of the branches of the armed services, as a customer who wants to purchase a system.
I believe we will qualify when we get to that point for Blue UAS when we get to the point where a customer is going to make an order. Of course, that's our objective.
Right. One of the questions from the audience is about many drones companies talking about BVLOS capabilities. Can you explain why your position is different, including the certificate for the platform?
Okay. Yeah. I'm not sure our position is different or maybe our ability. The question is our capabilities around operating truly remotely. Our drone, by design, is infrastructure. What that means is we're deploying the drone, and there's no ground control station or sticks, as they call them in the industry. There's no manual operation of our drone. We're always going to be operated from a remote location. Typically, that means it's a pre-programmed flight. Now, if you want to respond to an emergency or you want to change a pre-programmed flight, you have the capability to do that as an operator. What you're doing is pointing and clicking on a map, and the drone is intelligent enough and capable enough to reroute and make sure it's missing buildings or trees or wires and things of that nature.
Now, what we also do on top of this to ensure that we can operate remotely and comply with FAA rules around safety, which are obviously critical, is we have integrated airspace awareness tools, which include our Kestrel system, which is active radar and fused with an RF sensor. We have incredibly deep and rich airspace awareness. When we put that package together, the concept of operations, the capability of the system, the FAA has agreed to give us what are, by many accounts, some of the widest permissions to operate remotely that you'll find.
Right. Okay. That brings us to the end of our presentation. If you have any final thoughts for us, please let us know.
No, this is good. I appreciate it again. It was great to be here. I appreciate the questions and the engagement with the investors. I will just say this. I think we are going to have an incredibly good year, and I am excited about it. We are going to be building a really valuable company. I really appreciate the interest.
Thank you so much, Eric. We look forward to that. For the audience, thank you so much for participating today. Thank you.
Excellent. Thank you.