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Defense contractor Anduril and semiconductor manufacturer Qualcomm announced that they will begin manufacturing rugged laptops in the United States. The laptops, which will be sold under the BlueChip label, will be made for use by the military, government, first responders, and law enforcement and are intended to help bring back computer manufacturing to the United States, reports TechCrunch.
The new laptop will contain approximately 90% parts made in the U.S. or other allied countries with a roadmap for the company to ramp up to 100% domestic content in the future. A Qualcomm Snapdragon X Series processor will be at its core. Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon said the chip will be made at a TSMC facility in Arizona.
Luckey said he had found a US supplier for the glass over the screen, but the display itself is one of several components that are made only in China today. Anduril plans to use its Arsenal-1 facility in Ohio, where it is also building drones for the US Air Force, to manufacture BlueChip. Prototypes for the BlueChip computer exist today and Luckey said he expects to start taking orders for the first generation of the product in 2027.
“It’s an anti-surveillance computer,” Luckey said of BlueChip. The idea is that every hardware and software component can be tracked and audited. Anduril is also working to make the Arm-based laptop run Windows apps, the Linux versions used by government and older software that agencies still rely on, TechCrunch reported.
He said the BlueChip laptop would cost somewhere around 20% more than the average high-end PC, and said that normal consumers would be better served by buying a Dell laptop. It will be a very heavy, battery-life challenged laptop, he said. He said for now the first generation will be focused on government buyers and said consumers are welcome to order one and the company may create a waiting list.
Luckey declined to share production targets. The small prototype line now being run by Anduril will ramp up to full-rate production next year, Luckey said. So far, no subsidies or contracts have been given to the companies by the U.S. government to make the laptops. Anduril and Qualcomm are funding the work themselves out of their research budgets, DefenseScoop reported. Rugged computers are already a $5 billion market, TechCrunch noted.
"It might sound crazy for a company like Anduril to be doing something like this," Luckey told reporters, arguing that building a laptop is not far from what the company already does with its autonomous drones, DefenseScoop reported.
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