Hellcat drone, built on Ukrainian warfighter lessons, launched by Red Cat at Eurosatory
StoryJune 15, 2026
EURSATORY: Paris, France. The Hellcat aerial drone, built with lessons learned from Ukrainian warriors and engineers, was launched today by Red Cat Holdings at Eurosatory in Paris, France this week. Hellcat, a dual-use, small unmanned aircraft system (sUAS) built on Red Cat’s Black Widow platform is designed for rapidly evolving operational environments.
“The Black Widow was very directed towards requirements specific to the U.S. Army,” says Stan Nowak, Vicor President of Marketing for Red Cat Holdings. Those requirements were five to seven years old,” but we learned a lot from when we started to deploy our own folks to the front lines of Ukraine, especially engineers, to work with the Ukrainians on developing new technology.”
Hellcat is designed around Modular Open Systems Architecture (MOSA) principles, enabling customers to configure command-and-control, payload, software, and integration pathways based on operational needs. The platform is intended to support a broad range of customer requirements, including different government procurement frameworks, coalition interoperability needs, and mission-specific software environments.
The backbone of Black Widow was transformed into a new system, not beholden to those U.S. Army requirements, Nowak continued. “Now we can make the architecture of the system open up to address really any of our coalition partners around the world, because a lot of not everybody has the same needs, wants, and desires.
Hellcat’s baseline configuration includes GPS-denied operation from power-on, RTH Azimuth recovery without GPS, WEB™ Standoff Radio support, a low-visibility tactical finish, and a field-repairable, rucksack-portable design. The aircraft offers 50+ minutes of flight time, up to 6.8 miles / 11 km of range with maintained operator line-of-sight, and is available with Red Cat’s Ocellus™ 3CP three-camera payload option.
One of the results of the Red Cat’s team visit to Ukraine, was a “brand new three camera payload versus the two camera that's on Black Widow,” Nowak says. “That being said, a lot of the development that's going into this will retrofit back into Black Widow at some point. This becomes our new way forward of having really a [modular open system approach] MOSA compliant open architecture ala carte menu everything across the board.”
“For the development of this new platform, it’s been an ongoing honor to work side by side with Ukrainian drone experts in theater, continuously transforming our ISR drones to meet the ever-evolving demands of the battlefield,” says Jeff Thompson, Chief Executive Officer of Red Cat. “Small UAS programs need to keep pace with how operators are using them in the field. Hellcat reflects Red Cat’s approach to working directly with warfighters, incorporating feedback from operational environments, and folding those lessons back into the platform so users can adapt as the mission changes.”
Red Cat’s offerings have gaining traction not just in Ukraine, but throughout NATO, and that's why they unveiled Hellcat at Eurosatory, he says. “[For] NATO this aircraft is huge, because they didn't really see necessarily Black Widow with its specific U.S. Army requirements.”
Another lesson learned from Ukraine was to make the motor arms gray instead of black. “ What we learned in Ukraine is that when Black Widow was flying, because it has black motor arms, the visual signature was actually way higher.”
Hellcat complements Red Cat’s broader Family of Systems, which includes Black Widow, FlightWave Edge 130, FANG, Blue Ops Variant 7 Uncrewed Surface Vessel (USV), and command-and-control and autonomy capabilities across air, land, and sea. Together, these systems support Red Cat’s strategy to deliver trusted U.S. and allied robotic solutions that enhance situational awareness, operational effectiveness, and mission safety for defense and national security customers.
For more information on Hellcat, visit https://redcat.red/hellcat/.
