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Jul 7, 08:35
US Army depot ramps up drone parts production to cut foreign dependence
The US Army is expanding drone component production at Tobyhanna Army Depot in Pennsylvania, shifting the site from a maintenance center into a manufacturing hub for brushless motors and circuit boards. The effort is designed to strengthen US supply chains and reduce reliance on China and other overseas suppliers, according to Defense Daily and Breaking Defense.
Global drone demand continues to heat up, and Taiwanese manufacturers are aggressively expanding overseas. Industry players say the market's most urgent focus has shifted from price and delivery time to competition among trusted supply chains.

Amazon is preparing to launch its initial internet service for its low Earth orbit satellite network later this year, marking a key step in its attempt to turn Amazon Leo from a delayed space project into a commercial broadband platform.

With supply chain inventory normalization largely complete, Sonix Technology (Sonix) has seen business momentum recover. The MCU supplier is benefiting from resilient demand for microcontrollers used in medical monitoring devices and steady shipments of multimedia image-processing chips, giving it better order visibility for 2026 than in previous years. Meanwhile, the company's drone business has entered niche commercial and industrial applications, providing a stepping stone toward higher-end markets.
US drone maker AeroVironment has worked closely with Taiwan-based supply chain partners over the past three years, with the company noting that many of its product components are now co-developed and manufactured by both sides. Moreover, the defense tech company has also established a direct communication channel in Taiwan in recent years to support Taiwan's national defense resilience program.
Sharp is moving deeper into satellite communications as it seeks to extend its networking technologies beyond consumer devices and into industrial infrastructure.
The annual Shangri-La Dialogue, considered the most important defense and security conference in the Asia-Pacific region, was held this year in Singapore at the end of May. For this year's conference, however, China kept a low profile by sending a deputy president from its National Defense University, a move seen as its attempt to minimize the significance of the conference.

Japan is preparing to support a Rakuten-led low-Earth orbit satellite communications project, as the country looks to reduce reliance on foreign satellite networks and build a domestic direct-to-mobile connectivity layer for disasters, remote areas, and future digital infrastructure.

The Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) Listing Review Committee approved TMY Technology Inc.'s application to list on the Taiwan Innovation Board (TIB) on June 30. The proposed listing remains subject to final approval by the TWSE board of directors.

Taiwan's legislature moved defense drone proposals to committee review on July 3 after heated debate, advancing plans to fund a domestic autonomous unmanned vehicles program and prompting a near-term boost in activity across the local drone supply chain. The Executive Yuan had approved a draft special act backed by a special budget of NT$210 billion (US$6.6 billion) for procurement of autonomous defense unmanned vehicles, and rival bills from the Kuomintang and the Taiwan People's Party were also sent to committee review.
The Taiwan Space Agency (TASA) announced on June 30 that the wind data product generated by TRITON, Taiwan's first domestically developed weather satellite, has been upgraded to Version 2.1. The update significantly increases the volume of wind observation data and shortens processing time through an expanded ground station network and improvements to the data processing pipeline.

China's private rocket industry is entering a make-or-break decade, as low-Earth orbit satellite demand, reusable launch technology, and STAR Market reforms drive the race to build a "China SpaceX."