Key facts
- UForce reached a £4.5bn valuation after raising more than £500m from investors including the UK government.
- The UK's national wealth fund invested £113m in UForce.
- The Ministry of Defence said UForce will source hulls, engines, electronics and fit-out in the UK.
- More than 70% of the content of each UK-built UForce boat will come from British suppliers, the MoD said.
London-based naval drone maker UForce has reached a £4.5bn valuation after raising more than £500m from investors including the UK government, the company said in a report published November 12, 2026. The UK's national wealth fund contributed £113m, making UForce one of the country's fastest-growing unicorns, or startups valued at more than $1bn.
UForce makes military drones for land, air and sea, and its drones have been used extensively in the war in Ukraine. The UK's Ministry of Defence noted UForce's maritime capabilities in particular, citing concerns over the threat from Russia in the North Atlantic and North Sea. Russian naval vessels and its "shadow fleet" have been accused of sabotage and spying operations on cables and pipelines, while the UK is planning a fleet of sea-borne drones in the northern seas to track Russia's nuclear submarine fleet.
UK defence secretary Wes Streeting met UForce founder Oleg Rogynskyy on Thursday aboard the British aircraft carrier HMS Prince of Wales during a defence conference in Oslo, Norway. Streeting also piloted a UForce MV7 uncrewed vessel that was located over 1,500 miles away in the Atlantic Ocean near Portugal. Rogynskyy grew up in Dnipro, an industrial city in eastern Ukraine, before founding People.ai, a Silicon Valley tech unicorn focused on sales and operations data for businesses.
Rogynskyy said UForce wanted to "make aggression unaffordable" and that the investment would allow it to scale up production for Ukraine as well as for its allies. He added: "The war in Ukraine has shown that in an increasingly volatile world, effective defence requires systems that can keep improving as threats change." Streeting said: "Ukraine is rewriting the rules of warfare. In just a few years the UK has gone from training Ukraine to being trained by Ukraine, as they prove that who can innovate fastest is a key measure of modern military power."
The other lead investor was Valor Equity Partners, a private equity investor founded by Antonio Gracias, a former director of Tesla who is also on the board of SpaceX. Valor partner Christopher Cavoli, a retired US general who was Nato's supreme allied commander for Europe until last year, will join UForce's board. Former Conservative UK defence secretary Ben Wallace is also on the board.
The Ministry of Defence said UForce would invest in a British supply chain as part of the deal, with hulls, engines, electronics and fit-out sourced in the UK, and that more than 70% of the content of each UK-built boat will come from British suppliers.