Anduril and Qualcomm unveil BlueChip laptop line planned for US design and assembly

The laptops are planned to use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon X Series chips, and Anduril plans to use its Arsenal-1 facility in Ohio for BlueChip manufacturing, DefenseScoop reports. Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon told The Verge the company intends to manufacture the processors at TSMC Arizona.

US assembly comes before a domestic supply chain

The companies’ eventual goal is an end-to-end American supply chain, Bloomberg reports. The initial plan is narrower: US design and assembly. Luckey told The Verge that the share of components made in the US at launch was unsettled and that the first laptop shipped most likely would not be entirely American-made.

Anduril said more than 90% of prototype component procurement costs go to suppliers in the US and allied countries, The Daily Caller reports. That figure does not mean 90% of components are manufactured in America. Antonio G. Di Benedetto of The Verge is skeptical of the near-term American-made ambition.

Luckey has called BlueChip an “anti-surveillance computer” and said customers could install their own operating system. In a call covered by DefenseScoop, Amon suggested changing AI needs could create an opportunity for the laptops in industries with different security and supply-chain requirements. Those are the executives’ assessments, not demonstrated product outcomes.

Luckey said military officials had expressed informal interest, but stressed that the conversations were not contracts or spending commitments. He also told DefenseScoop that the US government had not provided subsidies or contracts to develop the laptops.