Critical facts about US's new mass-producible, cheap hypersonic missile

In a significant step to make hypersonic weapons more common, defence startup "Castelion" has won its first contract to integrate its “Blackbeard” hypersonic missile with current US Army and Navy platforms.

Opting for a hypersonic missile designed by a 3-year-old startup highlights the Pentagon’s shifting strategy for cheaper and mass-producible weapons to keep up with global hypersonic arms race.

Blackbeard is the first hypersonic strike weapon from Castelion that is designed for mass production and rapid fielding at a fraction of the cost of legacy weapons.

It is capable of flying more than five times the speed of sound and can change direction in flight making it highly difficult to counter.

Contrary to multi-million dollar missiles programs, Castelion’s core focus of designing Blackbeard is to ensure affordability and rapid production.

With Blackbeard, Castelion will produce thousands of the missiles annually at a fraction of the current cost potentially making them a standard weapon for the US military instead of a rare asset.

Additionally, a major component of the US army's plan is to make Blackbeard compatible with the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS).

This will help to deploy the hypersonic missile from mobile launchers that are already owned by the US army bypassing the need for complicated new launchers and speeding up deployment to frontline forces.