AI-drone specialist XTEND has landed a multi-year contract worth up to approximately $15 million with the Ministry of Defense of an unnamed European NATO member, with roughly $4.5 million secured for the first year, JFB Construction Holdings said on August 17.
NATO Buyers Move Off Chinese Drones
The deal lands as NATO militaries and allied ministries accelerate the shift away from Chinese-made commercial drones on security and supply-chain grounds. XTEND CEO Aviv Shapira said allied governments are reassessing platforms and putting a premium on trusted technology, secure supply chains and operationally proven systems. The company positioned the contract as a template for further deals across Europe, and said similar dynamics are creating the same pull in the United States, where federal procurement is tightening around NDAA-compliant systems.
XOS And The XFAB Manufacturing Footprint
XTEND delivers the work through its proprietary XTEND Operating System (XOS) and a global network of XFAB assembly sites in the U.S., U.K., Singapore, Israel and Latvia. The company says it now has more than 12,500 systems in the field across 30 countries and five combat zones. The NATO deal joins recent XTEND wins including a $9 million Middle East program and a $3 million Asia-Pacific Scorpio order.
Nasdaq-Bound Via JFB Merger
The contract lands three weeks before XTEND's expected market debut. XTEND and JFB Construction Holdings plan to close their business combination on September 8, 2026, at which point the combined company will be renamed XTEND AI Robotics and expects to trade on the NYSE under the ticker XTND. Effective SEC S-4 clearance came on August 11.
For NATO planners, the framework contract signals that European ministries are willing to write multi-year, XOS-anchored deals to lock in trusted autonomy, a trend also visible in the $1.5B DHS counter-UAS IDIQ that closed earlier this month.
Reporting based on coverage from GlobeNewswire and JFB Construction Holdings.