Perseus Defense GTM brain

category

market profile

• text: Cheap one-way attack drones make existing interceptors uneconomic, and Perseus prices its guided missile to restore favorable cost-per-kill exchange ratios.
• text: National policy tailwind: the White House drone executive order adds budget and urgency to counter-UAS procurement, and the company builds its marketing on it.
• text: Demand today flows through Army field experiments rather than program-of-record contracts; the company tested with the 1st Cavalry Division and its newsroom tracks that press closely.

personas

• title: Army / DoD counter-UAS acquisitions and requirements officer
  pains:

  • Incumbent interceptors cost orders of magnitude more than the drones they defeat, so every engagement burns scarce and expensive magazine
  • One-to-one systems do not scale against swarms, and current counter-drone layers leave gaps against Group 1 and 2 one-way attack drones
  • Procurement wants something that can be fielded to every convoy, base, and vessel in volume rather than boutique systems in small numbers
• title: Dismounted air defense / SHORAD operator
  pains:

  • Counter-drone gear is too heavy and slow to set up for units that move on foot or mount on vehicles
  • Operators need launchers that accept target data from existing C2 and sensors instead of another stovepipe system
• title: DHS / homeland critical-site protection buyer
  pains:

  • Many kinetic interceptors carry too much collateral risk to fire over domestic soil near people and infrastructure
  • Needs an affordable, repeatable way to protect bases, ports, and borders from drone incursions

icp

• text: U.S. Army divisions and units running counter-UAS or SHORAD experiments, like the 1st Cavalry Division's Golden Shield exercise at Fort Hood.
• text: DoD and DHS offices with drone-defeat requirements, engaged through cooperative R&D agreements with Army DEVCOM labs.
• text: Warfighting units that must mass capability: a sub-$10K interceptor enables distributed launchers across the battlespace instead of a handful of exquisite systems.

message pillars

• text: Cost asymmetry: a guided interceptor priced below $10K per shot, roughly 1% of incumbent solutions, restoring magazine depth economics.
• text: Purpose-built for the real threat classes: optimized against the small Group 1 and 2 drones actually used in one-way attacks.
• text: Portability and speed of employment: under 80 lb system, sub-60-second setup, vehicle or field deployment.
• text: Proof over promises: repeated live-fire flight tests and Army exercise participation as the credibility engine.

objections

• objection: A tiny YC startup cannot deliver real guided missiles reliably.
  response: Two-week design-build-test cycles produced 4 missile iterations and 30+ live-fire tests, and the company is standing up cooperative research agreements with multiple Army DEVCOM centers; ask for the test footage and production plan.
• objection: Sub-$10K missiles sound too cheap to be dependable kinetic interceptors.
  response: The low price is a designed-in constraint of the platform (a 16-inch-class Harpe, 2 km range) backed by flight tests; the pitch is volume manufacturing at a scale the world has not seen, not a stripped-down demo round.
• objection: How do you integrate with existing air defense networks rather than becoming another stovepipe?
  response: The launcher meshes with nearby launchers and takes target data from C2 or sensor systems, so it slots into existing sensor-to-shooter chains as a distributed engagement layer.

competitors

• name: RTX (Raytheon) Coyote counter-UAS interceptor
  website: https://www.rtx.com
  why: The incumbent Army counter-drone interceptor; Perseus is attacking the cost gap, claiming its missiles kill drones at 1% the cost of America's best existing solutions.
• name: Anduril (Anvil / Lattice counter-UAS family)
  website: https://www.anduril.com
  why: Venture-backed counter-UAS leader with networked autonomous interceptors; the most common alternative comparison for defense buyers who want startup speed.
• name: Fortem Technologies
  website: https://fortemtechnologies.com
  why: Counter-drone interceptors (DroneHunter) and radar sold to airports, bases, and critical sites, overlapping the DHS and critical-infrastructure part of the market.
• name: Epirus (Leonidas high-power microwave)
  website: https://epirusinc.com
  why: Non-kinetic counter-swarm option; buyers compare cost-per-effect and safety for domestic use where kinetic rounds are restricted.

influencers

• name: Matthew Bernard (Industrial Base Alpha)
  url: https://open.substack.com/pub/matthewbernard776320/p/perseus-defense
  why: Defense industrial base analyst whose Substack profiled Perseus Defense; his coverage shapes how the defense-finance community sees the company.

keywords

• counter-UAS interceptor
• counter drone missile
• Group 1 and Group 2 UAS threats
• cheap interceptor drone
• SHORAD interceptor cost
• Golden Dome
• one-way attack drone defense
• counter-UAS field experiment

voice

• mission-first and direct, calling out the U.S. Department of War by name on its homepage
• cost-focused aggression, leading with the sub-$10K per shot and scale claims
• engineer-operator credibility: live-fire tests and flight footage as proof

signals

• text: Army units running named counter-UAS field experiments are the live buyer events to track; Perseus's newsroom links Army.mil coverage of the Golden Shield exercise where providers tested new counter-UAS tech.
• text: Service lab CRADAs (DEVCOM centers) signal a transition from demos toward funded programs.
• text: Buying shifts from single launchers to distributed mesh networks once a unit validates the engagement envelope, so multi-launcher networked orders are the scale signal.

stack

• Framer website
• mesh-networked launchers (stated)
• autonomous guidance, navigation and control (stated)
• YouTube channel for test footage

hiring

• Engineer, Austin TX, $110K-$180K, 0.10%-1.00% equity (5 open roles listed on YC jobs)

pricing

motion

channels

• defense trade press (Defence Blog, War on the Rocks, WSJ)
• Army exercises and experiment events (Fort Hood, 1st Cavalry Division)
• YC network
• LinkedIn
• YouTube test footage
• monthly newsletter
• direct outreach to DoD/DHS

confidence

Founders

• name: Jason Cornelius
  title: Founder/CEO
  role: CEO
  bio: Co-founder & CEO of Perseus Defense. I helped lead major parts of the NASA Titan Dragonfly space helicopter. I also secured half a million of NASA HQ funding to lead an advanced concepts team using AI/ML/supercomputing to design next generation Mars helicopters. I teach aerospace engineering at Stanford, fly airplanes, have 7 scuba certifications, and speak four languages. I wrote a book in four months last fall, "Dare to Dream: A Small-town Kid's Journey to NASA."
• name: Steve Messinger
  title: Founder/CTO
  role: CTO
  bio: Co-founder & CTO of Perseus Defense. Swarm robotics researcher focused on building and deploying real-world autonomy. I’ve won swarm robotics competitions, built autonomy that allows Boeing aircraft to land themselves, and developed collaborative behaviors for unmanned boats.