Sep 2026 Pulse

Sep 2026 in brief.

September has 80 announced or closed events and a disclosed floor of ≥$18.27B, of which GE Aerospace’s signed agreement to acquire Consolidated Precision Products is $11.75B (64% of the floor); without that agreement the floor is ≥$6.52B. The next largest disclosed amounts are Stoke Space’s $1B Series E, Mach Industries’ $600M Series C continuation, TEKEVER’s $580M Series D first close and two $450M events: The Exploration Company’s Series C and the Department of War’s committed investment in The Elmet Group. Space & Launch had 18 events and Autonomous Systems & Robotics 11, each more than double its own monthly average. M&A accounted for 22 events: beyond GE–CPP, Ondas bought five companies in two packages ($205M and $56M), and Greenbriar agreed to buy Spectrum Control from AEA Investors without disclosing the price.

Public money was the industrial-base story: the Department of War committed $450M to Elmet’s tungsten supply chain, and $65M of Hertha Metals’ $133.65M Series A came from the U.S. government. Acquirers bought in batches: Ondas five companies, and Arxis, ITC Federal and Rohde & Schwarz two each. Read the floor as headline capital: CPP is a signed price expected to close in the second half of 2027, Elmet’s $450M is committed with $200M funded at closing, Quartermaster’s $140M includes a $40M debt facility, and Voyager Technologies’ $402.5M is convertible notes. This issue also draws on a wider sweep of European, Israeli and Asia-Pacific sources than earlier months, so part of the jump in counts is coverage, not only activity.

Activity vs each domain’s own baseline.

Each cell is the number of publicly announced deals in that domain and month. Color compares the month with that domain’s own average over the months shown, not a scale shared across domains, so a dark cell in a small domain means “busy for that domain”, not “large in dollars”. Domains with fewer than 12 events in the window are shown in gray without color. September was compiled from a wider source sweep than earlier months, so its dark column partly reflects coverage. Absolute totals across all issues are on the archive home.

The $205M Ondas package for GATE Technologies and Bron Technologies is in the September missiles dollars once; the $56M package for Insignito, Ottopia Defense and Caribou Labs spans two domains, so it is in the issue floor but in no domain cell. Earlier months are shown as published.

Top deals.

The ten largest disclosed amounts on event rows. Package prices are not on these rows.

Notable undisclosed

• Spectrum Control · M-PE-PLATFORM · 2026-09-29 · Greenbriar Equity Group (from AEA Investors) · Source
  RF and microwave components for defense, aerospace and space; terms not disclosed (Bloomberg reported a price above $1.8B before the announcement).
• Marshall Aerospace · M-CARVEOUT · 2026-09-02 · Aurelius · Source
  C-130 maintenance and modification for military operators; the sale is subject to UK national-security review.
• Synack · M-MERGER · 2026-09-02 · NetSPI (merger; KKR-backed) · Source
  Offensive-security testing for federal and defense agencies; merger with KKR-backed NetSPI, terms not disclosed.

Movers.

We flag a domain only when its last three months differ from the prior three by 30% or more and it has at least 36 events in the trailing 12 months. Smaller samples stay as raw counts on the heat map; we never quote month-over-month percentages. Part of September’s rise reflects the wider source sweep.

• Autonomous Systems & Robotics: 19 events in the last three months vs 7 in the prior three (+171%); 11 events this month against a 12-month average of 3.7, led by TEKEVER’s $580M Series D first close.
• Space & Launch: 20 events in the last three months vs 13 in the prior three (+54%); 18 events this month against a 12-month average of 4.4, led by Stoke Space’s $1B Series E.

Fund closes, programs and other items.

Fund closes, government capital programs and other supply-side items sit here, outside the deal statistics.

Sep activity by domain.

A full section (narrative and table) for any domain with five or more events this month; a compact list otherwise. Each event has one primary domain: the market the money is buying.

Deal table, method and definitions.

Issue deal table

Method & coverage

Public sources only · Issue window = first public announcement in Sep 2026 · 80 announced or closed events (financing 54 · M&A 22 · public markets 4) · Disclosed floor ≥$18.27B across 49 of 80 (39% undisclosed), including two Ondas package prices counted once ($205M and $56M) · Closings of deals first announced in an earlier month are not counted again · Capital-supply items are sidebar-only and excluded from domain statistics · Non-dollar amounts are converted at the European Central Bank reference rate on the announcement date · Heat-map colors use each domain’s own trailing-12-month baseline · Earlier months are shown as published; this issue draws on a wider sweep of European, Israeli and Asia-Pacific sources, so comparisons with earlier months overstate the rise in activity.

Event codes & terms

Method notes (this issue)

The disclosed floor uses headline capital as reported. An equity-only reading would use $100M for Quartermaster (not $140M) and leave out Voyager Technologies’ $402.5M of convertible notes. Elmet’s $450M is committed government equity, of which $200M was funded at closing; Hertha Metals’ $133.65M includes $65M of U.S. government equity; KVector’s £3.8M includes £950,000 of Innovate UK grant-linked funding.

Consolidated Precision Products is a signed purchase price expected to close in the second half of 2027. Stoke Space’s $1B Series E and TEKEVER’s $580M Series D are recorded at the stated round size after an initial and a first close respectively. REDLattice is recorded at $335M of committed capital and Astro Digital at its ~$50M PIPE; trust cash is not counted.

Amounts stated as “over” or “more than” are recorded at the stated figure: Covenant (over $250M across three rounds), HyImpulse (more than €50M) and Skylance (more than €1M).

Blue Moon Metals’ $25M equity subscription comes out of Elmet’s Department of War-backed program and is not added to the floor. Spectrum Control’s price was not disclosed; a pre-announcement report of more than $1.8B is not counted. Fortem Technologies’ September item is the second tranche and close of a $50M Series B whose $25M first tranche appeared in April; the second tranche’s size is not stated.

Ground A’s €9.1M pre-seed closed in June but was first made public on 8 September, so it is a September event. Sensofusion announced its intention to float on 23 September; IPOs are dated at pricing, so it will appear in October.

Airbility and CloudNC are recorded at the dollar figures the companies stated.

Domain definitions

About ASC

Abelian Security Council (ASC) gives clients in defense, national security and critical technologies direct, compliant access to the people who researched, designed, built, evaluated, bought, deployed and competed with the systems they are underwriting. Pulse is the public layer of that work: a curated tape of announced financings, acquisitions and listings, compiled from public sources and published monthly. Clients can schedule a call with Owen Davies, ASC’s Chief Executive. Members can apply to join.