Aug 16, 2024 · 44m · american-optimist
Electronic Warfare and Real-Life Force Fields! Epirus CEO Andy Lowery · Joe Lonsdale
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of American Optimist, host Joe Lonsdale interviews Epirus CEO Andy Lowery about how software-defined high-powered microwave (HPM) technology creates real-world electronic force fields to neutralize drone swarms and modernize military defense. Lowery outlines Epirus's role as an agile 'NeoPrime,' detailing automated counter-drone capabilities, successful military trials, and necessary procurement reforms to secure American technological edge.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Joe holds 17.7% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Joe as informed peer 4.6 Guest teaching 3.9 Guest disagreement 0.1 Joe pushing back 0.2
speaking balance: gold is Joe, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 14:46 Pushing back on immediate full AI autonomy
Andy tempers Joe's impatient view on AI defense automation by explaining operational doctrine and the historical necessity of stepping through man-on-the-loop systems.
Hardest push from Joe ▶ 14:17 Dismissing ethical hurdles to automated defenseJoe firmly rejects the idea that ethical concerns should slow automated AI shoot-down decisions when facing dynamic swarm attacks.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 10:56 Physics of tank drone defeat mechanicsAndy educates Joe on the explosive mechanics of contact charges, explaining why taking down a drone five to ten feet away completely neutralizes its destructive effect on armor.
Joe holds their own ▶ 32:28 Cost-exchange ratio of missile defenseJoe synthesizes the strategic bottleneck facing Western defense, demonstrating domain expertise in the cost-exchange asymmetry between cheap drones and expensive interceptors.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Joe as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Joe pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Welcome & Andy Lowery's Career Background from Navy to Epirus | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | Joe introduces Andy Lowery and notes his background with Raytheon and Next Generation Jammer. Andy details his trajectory from Navy nuclear engineer to prime contractor leadership and startups. | |
| Defense Primes vs. NeoPrimes & The Founding Mission of Epirus | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0 | Joe inquires about the incentives for leaving defense primes to build neoprimes. Andy explains how prime business models disincentivize internal R&D and details Epirus's architecture using GaN phased arrays. | |
| How High-Powered Microwave Phased Arrays Create Electronic Shields | 4 | 5 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks how close a drone can get before damaging a tank. Andy educates Joe on shaped contact charges and explains how neutralizing drones even five feet away prevents armor penetration. | |
| Countering Swarms with Wide-Area Microwave & AI Automation | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks what makes high-powered microwave inherently superior to lasers against coordinated swarms. Andy breaks down wide-area energy dispersion versus point-target optical beams. | |
| Human-in-the-Loop vs. Fully Automated Defense Systems | 5 | 4 | 2 | 3 | Joe argues that automated AI response against swarms is an obvious necessity and questions why ethical reservations persist. Andy contextualizes the military's gradual progression from man-in-the-loop to man-on-the-loop doctrine. | |
| The NeoPrime Playbook & Scaling Extended-Range HPM | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks about speculative hardware production and upcoming multi-branch partnerships. Andy describes the internal capital investment strategy and testing across Army, Marines, Navy, and Air Force programs. | |
| Integrating HPM with Reusable Autonomous Vehicles | 5 | 3 | 0 | 0 | Joe raises integration possibilities with Anduril's Roadrunner. Andy confirms technical viability, noting the economic efficiency of reusable autonomous interceptors equipped with HPM payloads. | |
| Space Domain Warfare and Satellite Protection | 5 | 4 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks about space domain defense and whether the vacuum environment enhances electromagnetic propagation. Andy explains the physics advantages and satellite defense use cases. | |
| Achieving Programs of Record and Overcoming the Valley of Death | 4 | 5 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks Andy to define a Program of Record and the requirements for defense startups to cross the valley of death. Andy details the long-term franchise economics and upcoming CENTCOM deployment milestones. | |
| Modernizing DoD Procurement and Asymmetrical Threat Economics | 6 | 4 | 0 | 0 | Andy explains production volume disparities between consumer-drone adversaries and prime missile production. Joe steps in to reinforce the critical economic asymmetry of interceptor depletion. | |
| Reinvesting Capital to Overcome Traditional Defense Blind Spots | 6 | 3 | 0 | 0 | Andy outlines why prime contractors cannot allocate hundreds of millions of free cash flow to speculative R&D. Joe adds that primes fundamentally lack Silicon Valley's top software and CS engineering culture. | |
| Fusing Silicon Valley Software Expertise with Defense Hardware | 5 | 4 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks about non-DoD domestic applications. Andy highlights border security and drone interdiction challenges, explaining bureaucratic friction with domestic regulators like the FAA and FCC. | |
| Congressional Reforms for Flexible Defense Budgeting | 4 | 5 | 0 | 0 | Joe asks what legislative changes Congress should enact to support defense innovation. Andy highlights the lack of in-year flexible spending and reprogramming authority within the defense budget. |
Statements from this episode (23)
Lowery: Traditional defense primes invest minimal internal R&D outside DOD programs
“Everything they do is tethered to, kind of, direction from the DOD, and so they do very little, like, internal commercial innovation. There isn't a lot of internal research and development dollars spent on pure innovation that isn't tethered to a DARPA or some…”
Lowery: Swarm attacks confound legacy defense prime electronic warfare systems
“We see the proliferation of swarms, swarms attacks, paralleled attacks, very paralleled attacks, which confounds basically the traditional defense prime electronic warfare.”
Lowery: Next Generation Jammer deployed aboard USS Abraham Lincoln
“And oh, by the way, Next Generation Jammer just went on its first deployment with the USS Lincoln. So now it's being shipped overseas.”
Lowery: Epirus is developing microwave shields for Abrams tanks and airfields
“And we have activity in a wide spectrum Of different sorts of applications that range from a very sort of close range self protect, like the Abrams tanks, for example, ranging all the way up into the protect a whole entire airfield.”
Lowery: FPV drones require direct impact, making short-range microwave defenses effective
“What happens is, is a first person viewer drone with what they call a contact charge needs to drive that first person view drone all the way into impact. Cause how the contact charge works is it hits the armor And then a little spike shoots through the armor, …”
Lowery: Epirus built automated targeting, but military rejects fully automatic mode
“The system now is in its infancy, but those hooks and those basically that fully automated mode is dialed into the way we architected it. So today, the military is not willing to go fully automatic”
Lowery: AI-controlled battle systems will be necessary to fight drone swarms
“And in the case of this type of warfare, it's going to be necessary. The necessary decision to go forward with AI-controlled battle otherwise a man or a human in the loop won't work.”
Lowery: Epirus system achieved 100 percent defeat rate in April Army trials
“We had zero targets that we did not take down. In other words, we were 100% effective on Every single scenario and every single target that they threw at us, we had an effect on”
Lowery: Epirus plans overseas front-line military deployment in fall 2024
“We intend to be in deployment mode come this fall. So in this fall, we'll have a final sort of test out of all the different bugs that we learned in the first limitations test, and then we'll send these things overseas to really, really, really be in the war a…”
Lowery: Epirus delivered four systems to Army in 15 months
“So when the army gave us a contract, they said, see if we can deliver these in a couple years, two and a, it was a two and a half years actually. We delivered four systems in 15 months. I mean, just unheard of. 15 months, four full systems to the Army.”
Lowery: Epirus can build HPM systems effective at 10-kilometer ranges
“We're confident that we can build HPM that can have effects, very, very ubiquitous effects out at those ranges as well. Very, very confident.”
Lowery: Epirus testing microwave weapon against boat motors with Navy
“We're going out with the Navy and participating in what's called Antex. And Antex is a program that we're going to take one of our systems and put a whole bunch of different outboard boat motors out in the water and see how far and how quickly and how effectiv…”
Lowery: HPM-equipped Roadrunner could take down 10 drones per flight and recover
“So even though, ah, HPM systems are relatively expensive compared to a 30,000 dollar drone, you can actually take down maybe 10 drones a flight and then re-land and, ah, recover with a Roadrunner.”
Lowery: High-powered microwaves will definitely become a major space warfare tool
“Space is a it would be a, it's definitely a domain where high powered microwave will become a significant player in. In the near future.”
Lowery: Epirus Will Enter a DoD Program of Record in 2025
“We are deploying to CENTCOM. If those deployments are successful, we will be palmed into a program or record In 20, 25.”
Lowery: Russia Can Build 500 Shahed Drones Per Month
“Russia, I think can build 500 shahads per month.
The group three shahad, 500 per month.”
Lowery: US Builds Only Dozens to One Hundred Air Missiles Monthly
“I think our entirety of our short range air missiles that we can build per month are in the dozens.
Like, I think in the tens or the, or maybe end up to like a hundred.
But just orders of magnitude less than what folks can build with consumer electronics.”
Lowery: China Can Probably Build 100,000 Small Drones Monthly
“If you talk group one and group two, China can build probably 100,000 group one and group two systems in a single month.”
Lowery: US Border Experiences Thousands of Drug Drone Incursions Without Interdiction
“They have somewhere along the lines of a couple thousand drone incursions over the border, and all we're doing today is just watching them fly on by. That's all we're doing. We're not doing a thing to them, and they're coming in, and we know they're carrying i…”
Lowery: Epirus Faces FAA Authorization Delays Even on US Military Bases
“In the frequencies we work in, a lot of those frequencies are run by the FAA. And so the FAA has to give us permission to radiate big radiation at those frequencies, and we've run into problems Domestically, even on bases, even on military bases, being able to…”
Lowery: Only single-digit billions of DoD budget are flexibly reprogrammable
“What people don't say that when you boil it down to what actually is reprogrammable, it's a tiny fraction of that. It's like, I think the army has maybe a hundred and fifty million, a billion, I'm sorry, a hundred and fifty billion dollars or less to do anythi…”