Red Cat Holdings acquiring commercial drone maker Teal Drones

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Red Cat Holdings to acquire Teal Drones in an all-stock deal.

Red Cat Holdings, a Puerto Rico-based technology provider to the drone industry, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Teal Drones in an all-stock transaction. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Salt Lake City-based Teal Drones, founded in 2014, makes aerial drones and related technologies for commercial and government applications. The company started out in the consumer drone space.

Red Cat said Teal will anchor its enterprise group, which already includes Skypersonic, a remote inspection company and Dronebox, an analytics platform for cloud-based flight intelligence. Other companies in the Red Cat portfolio include Fat Shark, a drone imaging and communication company and Rotor Riot, a lifestyle operation focused on the consumer segment.

“Adding Teal to the family helps Red Cat naturally expand deeper into the enterprise and government spaces,” said Jeff Thompson, CEO of Red Cat. “Teal’s Golden Eagle drone platform and its existing access to the Department of Defense combined with the market reach and experience of Red Cat should well-position the joint group for unbridled success as the industry grows.”

Teal’s flagship Golden Eagle is designed for reconnaissance, public safety, and inspection applications. Teal said that its open and modular platform allows a critical mass of applications to be developed and integrated for next-generation capabilities. The list of current partners actively integrating technologies with Teal include Autonodyne, Tomahawk Robotics, Dronelink and Skyward.

Teal is one of only five companies selected by the Department of Defense in 2020 as approved small unmanned aerial system vendors for the U.S. government. The other approved companies are Altavia, Parrot, Skydio, and Vantage. In March 2021, Skydio became the first U.S.-based drone company to become a unicorn after closing a $170 million Series D funding round.

“With Red Cat’s operational expertise and access to capital, Teal is amazingly positioned to rebuild America’s drone industrial base across sectors,” said Teal CEO George Matus. “We are incredibly excited to join Red Cat as Golden Eagle scales production and further applications are released.”