France exercises option for more MX-10 Damocles loitering munitions from KNDS and Delair

· Drones

TLDR

  • France's DGA exercised an optional tranche of its contract with KNDS France and Delair for more MX-10 Damocles loitering munitions.123
  • A repeat order under a year after first deliveries suggests a move towards sustained domestic production.12
  • KNDS did not disclose the quantity, value or delivery schedule.123

France's Direction générale de l'armement (DGA) has ordered more MX-10 Damocles one-way attack drones from KNDS France and Delair, KNDS announced on 13 October.123 The order exercises an optional tranche of the contract signed in July 2024, and KNDS says it will increase production capacity.12 The company did not disclose how many munitions were ordered, their value, or when they will be delivered.123

Damocles belongs to France's short-range remotely operated munition programme (MTO-CP) and to the MATARIS family of KNDS loitering munitions.23 Deliveries to the French armed forces began in December 2025.123 A January 2026 French ministry release said 460 would be delivered by July, and Defense WarRoom describes the July 2024 contract as reported to be a framework of up to 2,270 units with a firm initial batch of 460; neither figure is restated in the October announcement, so the size of the new lot is unknown.3 KNDS said in early 2025 that about 100 MX-10s had been supplied to Ukraine.3

Specifications cited by Defense WarRoom list a 3.5 kg munition with a 10 km range, 40 minutes of endurance, a 550 g fragmentation warhead, setup in under five minutes, and a datalink built to resist jamming, with navigation designed to work where GNSS is denied.3 These are manufacturer-reported figures and have not been independently verified.3

Why it matters: a repeat order less than a year after first delivery, with an explicit aim of raising production capacity, suggests France is moving short-range loitering munitions from an experimental buy towards sustained domestic production, even though the undisclosed quantity makes the real scale impossible to judge yet.

Sources

  1. France exercises option for additional MX-10 Damocles munitions (Janes)
  2. France orders further MX-10 DAMOCLES loitering munitions (IN Defence)
  3. France Orders More MX-10 Damocles, the 10 km Loitering Munition From KNDS and Delair (Defense WarRoom)