A public research surface · updated continuously
The drone war will be won by whoever owns the chokepoints.
Magnets, batteries, seekers, jammers, silicon. Drone Bottlenecks maps the physical supply chain behind every drone and counter-drone system — and the listed companies that own each choke. Own the strait, not the tanker.
48 names tracked · 10 chokepoints · free, no login
The chokepoints
I
Rare-earth magnets & motors
NdFeB magnets are a China-controlled chokepoint sitting inside every drone motor.
MP · USAR · LYSCF · UUUU · UMAC · AREC · VULCAN
II
Batteries & energy density
Flight time is payload math; silicon-anode cells and non-Chinese LiPo supply are the unlock.
AMPX · ENVX · ENS · ULBI · LYTEN · NANOTECH
III
EO/IR & thermal sensors
Every ISR payload and interceptor seeker needs germanium optics and thermal cores.
TDY · DRS · LPTH · LHX · ESLT · MRCY · UMICY
IV
RF, EW & detection
The counter-UAS kill chain starts with detect/track; jamming is the cheap kill.
DRSHF · AVAV · KTOS · LHX · CACI · ANDURIL · EPIRUS
V
Autonomy compute
GPS-denied autonomy needs edge AI silicon that fits drone power budgets.
NVDA · AMBA · QCOM · LSCC · LTRX · HAILO · SHIELDAI
VI
Airframes & primes
The visible layer: platform makers and program-of-record winners.
AVAV · KTOS · RCAT · ONDS · DPRO · ANDURIL · SHIELDAI
VII
Comms, datalinks & PNT
Anti-jam GPS and resilient datalinks decide whether anything works in a contested environment.
IRDM · MSI · BAESY · LHX · MOB · NN · DOODLELABS
VIII
NDAA-compliant supply chain
The anti-DJI choke: Blue UAS framework components and the reshoring of small-drone parts.
AVAV · MOB · NEROS · ONDS · RCAT · SHIELDAI · UMAC
IX
Interceptors & effectors
The $1k-drone-vs-$1M-missile cost asymmetry forces new kinetic and directed-energy effectors.
RTX · AVAV · KTOS · DRSHF · ONDS · ANDURIL · EPIRUS
X
Private giants & exposure vehicles
Anduril, Shield AI, Skydio, Epirus, Neros — the names that define the sector without tickers, and the listed funds that hold them.
ANDURIL · SHIELDAI · EPIRUS · VCX · DXYZ · ARKVX · XOVR
Latest brief · 2026-10-26
Friday stabilized the chip-exposed rungs of the drone basket after Thursday's rout, with PNT name NextNav and battery pure-play Enovix leading, while the defense primes gave back their safe-haven bid alongside a weak Dow.
The leader was NextNav (NN), up 9.4% to $10.08 on the comms-datalinks-and-PNT chokepoint — the positioning, navigation and timing layer that a GPS-denied drone fight depends on. Friday was a stabilization session, not a new catalyst: after Thursday's AI-and-semiconductor rout (the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.60% to 26,008.86 and the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index dropped 6.7%), the semis found a bid Friday — the SOX rose 0.44% to 10,779.46 — and the drone basket's highest-beta small-caps snapped back with it. There was no confirmed company-specific headline on the tape for NextNav; this was a risk-on rebound in a thin, high-beta PNT name, and it should be read as such rather than as a settled re-rating of its 900 MHz spectrum case.
The laggard was Umicore's ADR (UMICY), down 3.7% to $4.76 in its most recent session on the EO/IR-and-thermal-sensors chokepoint — the specialty-materials rung behind seeker optics. The decline extended a clean multi-day drift lower (5.37 → 4.76 across the week) with no company print attached; it was the only materially negative name in the basket on a day when most drone exposure rose.
The rebound concentrated in the silicon and energy rungs that were hit hardest Thursday. Autonomy compute recovered: Ambarella (AMBA) +5.4% to $66.50. The battery rung, which gates endurance, was the day's other leadership — Enovix (ENVX) +9.4% to $2.79 and Amprius (AMPX) +3.4% to $8.18, though EnerSys (ENS) slipped 1.5% to $166.08. The rare-earth-magnets chokepoint — this vertical's structural China dependency — stayed mixed-to-soft: USA Rare Earth (USAR) −3.1% to $9.33, Lynas (LYSCF) −1.7% to $7.64 and MP Materials (MP) −0.7% to $38.30, while Unusual Machines (UMAC) bucked it at +4.6% to $17.02. The prime rung, which had been Thursday's safe haven, gave the bid back as the Dow fell 1.23%: RTX (RTX) −1.9% to $191.01, L3Harris (LHX) −0.1% to $253.97 and BAE Systems' ADR (BAESY) −0.8% to $103.33, though AeroVironment (AVAV) rose 4.7% to $123.25 and CACI (CACI) +2.4% to $633.98.
The calendar now turns on China and the FAA. The one-year suspension of Beijing's October 2025 rare-earth export controls expires November 10, and the separate gallium/germanium/antimony export-ban suspension lapses November 27 — the two dates that most directly reprice the magnet and sensor straits. The FAA's Part 108 BVLOS final rule, the demand unlock for domestic commercial fleets, remains expected by December 31, and the NDAA §844/§854 ban on Chinese-melted magnets in DoD systems takes effect January 1. Until the November export-control dates clear, the magnet rung, not the airframe rung, stays the variable to watch.