The 2020s: a decade of UAV spending growth
Procurement of tactical UAS, such as RQ-20B Puma for the US Marines Corps, is one of the drivers for a decade of growth. (Photo: USMC)
Total annual drone spending has increased nearly sixfold since the start of the decade, from $2.9 billion in 2020 to $16.3 billion in 2028, with Europe leading the rise.
Speaking at the Drone Summit 2025 in Riga, Latvia, Theo Francken, Belgium’s Minister of Defence, stated that uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) were the future of warfare.
Francken described the capability being comparable today with the revolutionary impact gunpowder made in the Hundred Years War or the influence that the industrial revolution had on World War I.
The use of UAVs in combat is nothing new. They were used in the Bosnia War in the 1990s and throughout the Global War on Terror (GWoT) military campaigns carried out in the wake of the 11 September 2001 attacks against the US.
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