French firm develops autonomous 2,000 km strike drone

French defense startup Harmattan AI has unveiled IRIFI, an autonomous long-range loitering one-way attack drone system that the company says is designed to hit targets up to 2,000 km (1,240 miles) away without relying on satellite navigation or human control during flight.

The company revealed the system on October 6, marking its move into deep strike, the category of weapons used against depots, factories, airfields, command posts and logistics hubs far behind the front line. Harmattan AI did not disclose IRIFI’s speed, payload, unit cost, development status or any customers.

IRIFI fires from a mobile launcher that holds the weapon in a canister, and the company says its architecture is designed for rapid deployment in large numbers. Harmattan AI says the system can carry out a full mission without anyone controlling it after launch, using an onboard navigation system that does not depend on GPS or other satellite signals, plus a camera-based guidance system for the final approach. The company says this lets IRIFI fly low enough to avoid radar detection and strike with meter-level accuracy.

Commanders choose and confirm the targets and set the mission parameters before launch, the company said, and the weapon then flies the mission on its own within those limits. Harmattan AI says a single commander can launch dozens of strikes, supported by an AI system that processes large volumes of satellite imagery.

“The Shahed is cheap and easy to produce at scale, but it is imprecise and easy to shoot down. Tomahawks and Storm Shadows are exquisite pieces of technology with high survivability, but they are expensive and produced in very limited numbers. AI-powered autonomy now makes it possible to combine the best of both worlds, and that is exactly what we did with IRIFI,” said Mouad M’Ghari, chief executive and co-founder of Harmattan AI.

The company pitched the design around jamming and spoofing, which have made satellite navigation and radio control unreliable over long distances in recent wars. Harmattan AI says IRIFI is meant to let forces mount saturation attacks in numbers that traditional missiles cannot match, while keeping costly weapons in reserve for the most critical targets.

Founded in Paris in 2024, Harmattan AI raised $200 million in a Series B round in January 2026 led by Dassault Aviation, the maker of the Rafale fighter, at a valuation of $1.4 billion. The two companies also agreed to work on AI and autonomy for Dassault’s future combat aircraft.

Harmattan AI says it has won several programs of record with the French and British defense ministries. The UK Ministry of Defence ordered 3,000 of its unmanned systems in 2025, and the drone the company supplied to French forces that year was a 1.8 kg (4-pound) quadcopter with 40 minutes of flight time, Defense News reported.

Before IRIFI, the company’s lineup covered short-range air defense, surveillance, tactical strike and training systems, including the Gobi interceptor, the Sahara surveillance system and the Barkhan tactical strike system.