Tobyhanna Army Depot, Darkhive Partner in First-Ever Title 10 §7544 sUAS Agreement
Tobyhanna Army Depot and defense tech firm Darkhive have executed a historic public-private agreement to advance sUAS manufacturing and lifecycle management. The partnership represents the first-ever implementation of 10 U.S.C. § 7544.
Tobyhanna Army Depot has entered into a landmark public-private partnership agreement with aerospace and defense technology company Darkhive to accelerate the rapid manufacturing and advanced lifecycle management of small Unmanned Aerial Systems (sUAS). Notably, this transaction marks the historic first execution of Title 10 of the U.S. Code, Section 7544. The statutory provision authorizes military depots to collaborate directly with commercial technology entities, combining commercial agile manufacturing and technical innovation with federal depot infrastructure to modernize warfighter capabilities while reinforcing organic industrial base readiness.
For Department of Defense leadership and acquisition authorities, this implementation validates a crucial statutory mechanism to scale attritable, low-cost autonomous systems without relying exclusively on traditional, long-lead prime contract pathways. Fusing Darkhive’s commercial autonomous technology and software-defined architectures with Tobyhanna’s high-capacity manufacturing infrastructure directly targets systemic bottlenecks in sUAS volume production and post-deployment sustainment. As modern operational environments increasingly mandate high-rate production and continuous software-hardware iteration for uncrewed systems, leveraging organic industrial facilities to co-produce commercial defense platforms provides the joint force with a scalable, resilient supply network.
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