Meet Wild Hornets - Ukrainian FPV Manufacture |@69thSniffingBrigade
May 15, 2024
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFtY0ZWHlec
ALEX KINASH: Hi everybody, it’s Alex Kinash here from 69th Sniffing
Brigade. I’ve got a very special interview for everyone today with Dima,founder of the Wild Hornets.

Fr those who don’t know, Wild Hornets are an FPV manufacturer fromUkraine. They make really good FPVs that we’ve all been seeing on theinternet blowing up Russian tanks, electronic warfare and otherequipment. They’re one of the main suppliers to us when we’re looking tobuy drones to give to units in our fundraisers.
Dima and his team have very kindly invited us today to their warehouse
where they do their work, and we’re going to learn a bit more about him,
the company and how they do what they do, and what the future of theindustry is going to bring. So watch this interview and hope you enjoy.
Thank you very much for inviting us. How did the Wild Hornets start?
DMYTRO PRODANYUK: The Wild Hornets organization was established on March 31,
2023, when the first video message to our audience was recorded. It was historicallythe beginning of our project.
In that video, I said words like “Friends, we arestarting a new project that will be related to FPVdrones.” It was this moment that marked the start ofour project.
In fact, the history of our project begins with ourmilitary. I’ve been a volunteer since the beginning of
the war, so it all started when soldiers fighting on thefront line approached me and asked, “Dimitri, do you
want to work on FPV drones? Because we have a hugedemand for this industry right now.” That’s how theWild Hornets project began. I told the military, “Okay,give me a few days. I’ll figure out what it is.” Aftersome time passed, I immersed myself in this area andgave the answer: “Okay guys, I’m ready to do thisproject.”

March 31, 2023: screenshot fromDima’s video of the first two Wild
Hornets he built in his garage

I started this project at my own expense. At that time
there was no one to buy spare parts and components
for these guys at their own expense. I decided I would
help them and at the same time continue to study this
topic and scale up my project.

And did you have experience with the drones before the full-scale invasion?
No.
So you’ve got an engineering background, or you’re just normal Ukrainianguy?
No, I’m actually a programmer by profession and I’m quite well versed in moderntechnology. I’m very interested in engineering, so I was very interested in how to apply it
to the production of FPV drones. And of course, the topic of drones was very interesting
to me. It all started with helping the military on weekends, and then it turned into a fulltime job. I began to devote all my time to the topic of drones and their production.
So you’re an IT guy and it’s a technical piece of equipment, and it’s
becoming a technical war. Where do you think drone warfare is going to go
next? How is it going to keep evolving?
I’ll give you a little insight into what we are working on now: automatic homing. I canalso tell you that it is already in the process of being tested in combat conditions. At
the front line, we seem to be playing with the enemy. First, the enemy is on somefrequencies, we are on others, and then vice versa. It’s a kind of balance. The technologyof automatic target acquisition will put an end to this whole story. This is what we areworking on—that is, the drone will find the target automatically. It will not be interferedwith by any electronic warfare, absolutely nothing. Therefore, it will be a very serious
weapon that will be extremely difficult to counter.

April 2024: video screenshot of testing Wild Hornets with automated guidance.

You’re saying that, in that terminal phase as it’s locked the target, the drone
will just carry on and it doesn’t matter if the drone has connection
anymore, so it’s just a silent drone so electronic warfare and jamming don’tmatter?

Yes, it will be a very destructive weapon—very powerful. We are working on thistechnology with two teams. We are working on several options with partners with whom
we will do this. The work is already in the homestretch. And we are now working on
encrypting the technology so it doesn’t fall into the hands of the enemy and be usedagainst us later. I can say that we will launch this technology into production
approximately this summer.

This is obviously good news for Ukraine. But we need to keep developing
more, don’t we? Because we’re not fighting against an enemy that stands
still either.
Of course. Ukraine is developing the topic of FPV drones for the whole world, so I don’t
think we will stop there. Automated homing will be a huge breakthrough. But then there
will be something more interesting. I think the next technology will be a squadron ofdrones—a kind of swarm of drones that will find a target and attack it with several
drones at once. This will be the next stage after automatic homing. It is technicallypossible to fly in a swarm where five or seven drones find and neutralize a target,
because usually one drone is not enough to completely destroy a tank, for example. You
need several FPVs for such armored targets.
That makes sense. To talk a little bit about actually making the drones, isthat something simple? Can someone like me just follow your instructions,or is it quite a complicated process?
There is a widespread belief among the population that it is very easy to build a drone
and that it can be done at home. But this is not the case. For such purposes, you need ateam of people who are experts in their field. That’s because there are a lot of parts madeto order specifically to each type of FPV drone, which are also customized and modified
for each task.

Do you ever get problems with components where there’s a lot of need for
different parts that go into your drones and other drones? How do you deal
with the challenges of having all the bits you need to actually produce thedrone?
This is an interesting question because I am personally involved in this work. From thevery beginning of the creation of the Wild Hornets, I have been personally involved ingathering the spare parts. I take care of all these tasks myself. I have a huge circle ofsuppliers with whom I constantly work. You could call it a whitelist.
I have been working with them for a long time, almost from the very beginning. They
cover all the critical points for me. So to say that we stopped because there were nospare parts, that has never happened before. We are constantly working on different
options for supplying components for drones. We try to look a few steps ahead tounderstand what will happen next. One of main tasks is not to stop. We need to keep
working and produce as many drones as possible.

March 2024: video screenshot of the Bulava drone unit using a Wild Hornet that is about to hit an enemy
tank, the unit’s 100th strike on enemy equipment

We’re facing an enemy that is on a war footing—Russia and China. Ukraine
has to arm itself. It can’t just rely on America and Europe. So what do you
think Ukraine and Europe and the rest of the world need to do to help
companies be able to scale manufacturing and provide enough drones towin the war? What can other countries, organizations or companies do to
make sure there are enough components available so Ukraine can win thewar?
I think it would be good for Europe to get involved in the production of FPV parts andthe drone industry in general. There are a few European companies that have contacted
us about collaboration, and they want to partner with us to produce some spare parts fordrones. As of today, we are having discussions with these companies. The purpose ofthis partnership is to create a certain surplus of parts to stop being dependent on theChinese market, which currently dominates our supplies. We are explaining to our
European partners that speed in deliveries is very important to us, but also the quality ofthe parts, and of course, the final price. We need to be able to compete with China on
equal terms.
The difference also lies in the approach to production. Chinese suppliers have a highspeed in manufacturing parts, but the quality of parts suffers as a result. With Europeansupplies, it’s the other way around. Quality comes first, but it takes a long time toproduce quality parts. In Ukraine, the war is going on every day, and so time issometimes a luxury for us. We explain all this and try to find some compromises in ourwork. I believe that in the near future, we will receive supplies from Europe, and we aremaking every effort to make this happen. But I have to admit that a large percentage ofparts still comes from China.

Wild Hornets are automating production to scale, cut costs and reduce reliance on foreign suppliers

I think that speed of delivery of equipment is how our charity works too. We
can get a unit request, do a fundraiser and buy drones. We recently wentfrom request video to funds to making an order of Wild Hornets in about
five days, I think. We move much quicker than governments can. So myquestion is, apart from our own NGO, which buys them, how else do you getyour drones out to the units that need them?
If we go back to the creation of the Wild Hornets, it was a difficult task. We checked
each combat unit in detail, watched videos of successfully completed targets and met inperson. Bt back then, there were fewer drones. Now, when there are many more drones
and we’ve already scaled up our production, the military units have grown anddeveloped along with us. We have our own community, more than 30 professional units.

These are the units we work with on a regular basis, meaning we provide them with FPV
drones. We do this because we see how the units use our drones to their maximum effecthitting targets.
But at the same time, we are looking for young units that want to develop in thisdirection and to help them as well. We work with them in the following way. We givethem test batches—which can be five or 10 drones—and watch the result of their workon the target. Feedback from the unit in the process is important to us. Sometimes it
happens that guys take the drones and then disappear—do not get in touch. If the unit
communicates with us, we see the results of the work on defeating the enemy and thenwe start to increase the supply of drones. After a while, the unit gets on our list ofpriority units. This is how this number is constantly increasing.
You make sure you only give your drones to good quality operators andpilots that will do the most damage?
We allocate the number of drones in percentage terms—so many drones to a unit. It all
depends on the priority of the unit, and therefore new units receive significantly less.
If we can just ask a bit about the units. You said there was a delay of one
day. Did that mean that the pilots were unable to do their mission, or that itcost people’s lives?
Yes, such stories do happen. We lost a position, and unfortunately there were casualties
on our side. And all because we didn’t have time to deliver the drones in time. There
were problems in communication with the unit. They had no connection, we did notprovide information on time, and because of this, the position was lost. Unfortunately, I
have to admit that these are not isolated stories in the war. Someone somewhere does
not have time to do something, there’s no communication and so on.
That’s why our priority is to produce as many FPV drones as possible, and as quickly aspossible, to supply them to the frontline combat units. We are doing everything we canto help our military. The Wild Hornets project is entirely charitable; the team consists ofpeople who are professionals in their field and who really want to help the military, so
we are all making every effort to win. We are not interested in commercial projects andtasks at the moment.
We can see some patches here in this flag. Can you tell us a little bit about
this unit? They obviously use your drones. Are they one of your early units
that you told us about?
This is a special unit for me because it is the same unit that offered me to work in theFPV area. This is the Bulava unit; these are the guys I started working with. I’ve known
them since the very beginning of the Wild Hornets organization, so I can safely say thisis a part of us. This unit is now achieving extraordinary results in the fight. Just afew days ago, we received a video from them where the guys destroyed the 100th
enemy military unit. Of course, they’ve made many more flights; no one even counts.
But recently, they had an anniversary and an enemy tank came under their sights, and it
was the 100th one.

Amazing. Two more questions then. What can we expect from Wild Hornets
in the future then? What’s next and how is it going to keep evolving?
The only way I see the fund developing is to scale up, to be able to reach a new level ofdrone production, and to be able to meet all the immediate needs and plan ahead. We
have had a strong push of R&D, which means that our engineering is working at themaximum level.
We have also hired an additional team to develop new products. At the same time, weare developing the test department to make drones even better and to reduce thenumber of Chinese spare parts. We are also continuing to refine the automatic targetingsystem. Significant resources of the team are devoted to this technology.
And of course, we are looking for funding to scale up, convert financing into parts andconvert parts into a destroyed enemy. Today we can produce 5,000 drones per monthwithout any problems; we can scale up without any problems. We have everything
technically ready. We are working on finding investors and funds for this. In conclusion,I would also like to say that our story of the Wild Hornets began with nothing. We had
only a garage where we took our first steps in this area on a whim. Today we have grown
to everything we have, and I see no problem in growing much more.
Last question then. We scale Wild Hornets, we destroy Russians, and wehave victory. What does Dima want to do after the war’s won?
I want to return to what I did before the war. I’m talking about tourism. I spent a few
years of my life travelling, doing active tourism. I really want to return to this. That’s all,nothing else. Thank you for this conversation.
Well everyone, that was an interview with Dima of the Wild Hornets. I hope
you enjoyed it. Please make sure that you like, subscribe and continue todonate to all of our fundraisers so that we can keep buying more brilliant
drones that the Wild Hornets make. The units like this.
The quicker we can raise more money, the quicker we can defeat Russia andthe enemy, and then Dima can go on his holidays and everyone can have abit more of a relaxing time. Thanks a lot for watching, I hope you enjoyed itand I’ll see you all again.
Interview transcription by Odessa Roslin. This interview was lightly edited for clarity.

Wild Hornets official media

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