Shield AI Achieves Groundbreaking Collaborative Multi-Jet Aircraft Autonomy in Kratos MQM-178 Firejet Flight Test Event

Shield AI, Inc., the technology company building the world’s best AI pilot, completed a major milestone on the path towards its overarching goal of providing autonomy for the world by successfully demonstrating its first-ever multi-jet autonomy flights on two Kratos MQM-178 Firejets.

The flight tests featured two autonomous agents piloted by Shield AI’s ‘Hivemind’ AI Pilot. These agents teamed up to perform coordinated maneuvers, demonstrating operationally relevant collaborative behaviors. This demonstration highlighted the capabilities of future unmanned jets and drones, with all computing executed on board and in-air agent communication seamlessly integrated.

“In the next decade, AI pilots will command and maneuver all unmanned systems, enabling the US and our allies to deploy millions of intelligent, resilient drones,” said Brandon Tseng, Shield AI’s President, Co-founder and a former Navy SEAL. “These Firejet flight tests represent a key milestone on our journey to bring autonomy to the world. What’s awesome is that the algorithms are not limited to the number of aircraft. For test objectives and budgetary reasons, we limited the number of Firejets to 2, but it could have been 4, 8, 16, 32, and so on.”

This builds on multiple AI-piloted Firejet flight tests completed earlier this year, which marked the sixth aircraft to be flown by Shield AI’s Hivemind AI Pilot. In June, the team completed its inaugural Live Virtual Constructive (LVC) integration, which bridges live platforms with virtual environments and enables dynamic interactions across different domains.