Thiel-Backed Startup Unveils Cheap Missile for China Fight

Anthem carries a payload of more than 200 kg (441 pounds) and is powered by a solid rocket motor for takeoff and a heavy-fuel jet engine for cruise flight, Reuters reports. In a fight it would be fired in high volumes alongside weapons like Raytheon's 1,000-mile Tomahawk and Lockheed Martin's 600-mile JASSM-ER.

Military planners envision ground-launched weapons fired from allied islands near China, such as the Philippines — a stretch of roughly 2,000 miles that would put Chinese targets in range without relying on manned aircraft or carrier strike groups, according to Reuters.

The pitch is built on supply chain, not exotic technology. Covenant says most of Anthem's components are commercial off-the-shelf, that it deliberately avoided sole-source suppliers by lining up three solid-rocket-motor providers with a fourth in the works, and that it has locked in long-term agreements for more than 4,000 jet engines over the next two years.

Beyond Dallas, Covenant runs a plant in Leipzig, in the German state of Saxony — Reuters reports it will also have a 5,000-unit annual capacity, while the Jerusalem Post reports the company aims to build 1,000 missiles a year there starting next year — and a smaller facility in northern Israel that Reuters says will make 2,000 units a year.

The timing is not an accident. The unveiling comes as the US and its allies scramble to restock precision-strike munitions after the war in Iran drew down inventories faster than the traditional primes can refill them.