On Friday, April 24, 2026, the U.S. Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division (NAWCAD) in Lakehurst, New Jersey, acting on behalf of the U.S. Department of Defense, signed a 104,998,566 USD contract with domestic start-up Castelion Corporation to support activities related to launching serial production of Blackbeard hypersonic missiles.
Photo: Castelion Corporation
This is a continuation of the February 25 contract worth 49,998,005 USD, for the production of full-scale Blackbeard hypersonic missile prototypes, flight testing, and operational deployment, in order to accelerate development, integration, testing, and achievement of Initial Operational Capability (IOC) under Phase III of the government’s SBIR (Small Business Innovation Research) program, topic AF231-D026, titled Low-cost, high-rate production of long-range weapons.
The additional modification also includes a provision for conducting weapons range tests in the area of responsibility of the United States Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM), while Castelion’s press release specifies that the Blackbeard missile will be integrated with the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet multirole aircraft.
The work will be carried out at Castelion’s facilities in Torrance, California, and is expected to be completed in January 2028. Funding comes from U.S. Navy research, development, test, and evaluation savings under the FY2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), amounting to 33,983,566 USD, and the same category of funds from the FY2026 budget, amounting to 71,015,000 USD. The former funds will expire at the end of the current fiscal year, on September 30, 2026.
The work is intended to enable Early Operational Capability (EOC) in 2027, preceded by extensive system safety and certification testing, flight tests, and other integration activities related to aircraft carrier operations.
“The U.S. Navy’s commitment to fielding affordable, innovative hypersonic capability reflects the kind of leadership this moment demands and clear determination to move fast for the warfighter,” said Bryon Hargis, CEO and Co-Founder of Castelion. “We’re grateful for the continued trust in Blackbeard and in our team.”
Blackbeard missiles will enter service not only with the U.S. Navy. On December 5 of last year, the start-up received a Series B contract worth 350 million USD from the U.S. Army Contracting Command (ACC) to launch serial production of the missiles. The agreement provides for the construction of a new production and final assembly facility called Project Ranger in Sandoval County, New Mexico, as well as launcher platform tests in 2026. Earlier, on October 24 of the same year, the company announced that it had received initial funding to integrate the missile with launch platforms for both the U.S. Army and the U.S. Navy.
Earlier still, on February 26, 2024, the Office of Naval Research (ONR) awarded Castelion Corp. a contract worth less than 3 million USD to study the feasibility of integrating an unspecified air-launched weapon for attacking surface targets.
In the past, the U.S. Navy was interested in the HALO (Hypersonic Air Launched Offensive Anti-Surface) hypersonic anti-ship missile, which RTX and Lockheed Martin were working on. In turn, on April 10 of this year, it published a notice for a tender under the FLASH (Flight Advancement of Structures for Hypersonics) research-and-development program for hypersonic missile technologies for warships.
The @USNavy has awarded @Castelion a $105M contract to integrate Blackbeard, the Navy's first air-launched hypersonic strike weapon, onto the F/A-18E/F Super Hornet.
We're grateful for the trust the @DeptofWar has placed in our team and are committed to delivering Blackbeard to… pic.twitter.com/UjkoPMgDAs
— Castelion (@Castelion) April 24, 2026