Utah firm builds a robot vehicle meant to replace military trucks

A robotic combat vehicle that can drive itself 280 miles while charging drones, powering radar and running a portable command post has rolled through a demonstration in the Utah desert for a room full of government, defense and technology leaders. Hypercraft, a Provo, Utah-based autonomous vehicle company, showed off its Razorback unmanned ground vehicle at South Valley Regional Airport last Friday, giving officials a firsthand look at a machine the company argues represents the future of how militaries move equipment and generate power on the battlefield.

Razorback is built on what Hypercraft calls its Carbon vehicle architecture, a software-defined computing framework that separates the vehicle’s hardware from its software, allowing operators to reconfigure the machine’s mission, update its systems and swap out payloads through code rather than physical modification. That same architecture is what lets Razorback shift between wildly different jobs depending on what a unit needs that day, whether that means hauling ammunition to a forward position, evacuating a wounded soldier while running the onboard medical equipment keeping that person alive, or standing in as a mobile communications relay and electronic warfare node when a unit’s fixed infrastructure gets knocked out or left behind.

Powering all of that is a diesel hybrid-electric drivetrain generating 300 horsepower through a four-motor torque-vectoring system, paired with a 50-kilowatt range extender capable of 95-kilowatt peak output. That combination gives Razorback a top speed of 60 mph (97 km/h) and a range of 280 miles (450 km) while carrying a full payload of up to 2,400 pounds (1,089 kg), and the vehicle can export as much as 38 kilowatts of power to whatever equipment gets plugged into it in the field, effectively turning the machine into a rolling generator rather than just a cargo hauler.

Hypercraft has described that capability as a tactical microgrid concept, treating Razorback less like a standard truck and more like a mobile energy node that can charge drones, run directed energy weapons or sustain a forward command post entirely on its own, all without a single person riding inside it.

Retired Brig. Gen. Paul Peters, speaking at the demonstration, framed that shift toward adaptable, software-driven platforms as a fundamental change in how militaries need to think about ground mobility.

“The future of tactical mobility isn’t legacy vehicles, it’s adaptable, flexible mission platforms that adapt as quickly as the mission does,” said Peters.

That flexibility matters because militaries have spent years struggling with a persistent vulnerability that Razorback is specifically designed to reduce, the risk of moving fuel, supplies and personnel through contested territory using traditional convoys that make easy targets for drones and long-range strikes. Hypercraft’s engineers built physical redundancy directly into Razorback’s propulsion system to address that same battlefield reality, designing the vehicle to keep operating even if multiple motors, the range extender, or parts of its energy storage system take damage, a resilience feature meant to keep the machine functional after the kind of hit that would typically disable a conventional vehicle outright. The Razorback also carries counter-unmanned aircraft system capabilities aimed at Group 1 and 2 drone threats, the military’s classification for smaller, slower unmanned aircraft that have become an increasingly common and cheap way for adversaries to harass forward-deployed units.

Friday’s demonstration doubled as a public rollout for a broader business strategy Hypercraft has been building toward since formally unveiling Razorback in May. According to reporting from TechBuzz News on the same event, Hypercraft CEO Brian Bowers told the roughly 70 legislators, officials, investors and media members in attendance that the company plans to compete in a ground vehicle market it projects will grow by $45 billion over the next decade, driven partly by Ukraine’s rapid embrace of unmanned ground systems, with Hypercraft citing projections that Ukraine alone could purchase 50,000 UGVs in 2026. Bowers said the company intends to capture that growth both by selling Razorback vehicles directly and by licensing its underlying Carbon Architecture to other manufacturers building their own unmanned ground vehicle programs, a strategy that would position Hypercraft’s software stack as common infrastructure across a broader category of military robotics rather than tying the company’s fortunes to a single hardware product.

The Utah demonstration drew support from a coalition of local and industry partners, including the economic development organization 47G, the City of West Jordan, South Valley Regional Airport, the counter-drone company Fortem Technologies, and the firm Base Case, reflecting the kind of state-level defense industry backing that has increasingly become part of how emerging military technology companies build credibility before landing federal contracts.

Fortem Technologies’ involvement carries particular weight given the company’s own focus on counter-drone radar and airspace security systems, suggesting a working relationship that could eventually integrate Fortem’s detection technology directly onto a platform like Razorback, though neither company has publicly detailed the specifics of that partnership beyond their joint presence at the demonstration.