Sener, the Spanish aerospace and defense technology firm, has unveiled the SRC 100 Razor—a 150-kilogram stealth-capable unmanned aerial vehicle designed for both realistic aerial target simulation and autonomous intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions. Presented at the World Defense Show 2026 in Riyadh, the drone is the first system to emerge from the company’s SIROCO project and represents Spain’s most significant domestic UAV development in years. Rafael Orbe, Sener’s Defence General Manager, described the platform as a “flexible solution” built for requirements “evolving at great speed.”
The problem Sener set out to solve is not whether drones can perform reconnaissance or simulate enemy aircraft—they have done both for decades. The problem is that most drones are built to do one thing well and everything else poorly. A high-fidelity aerial target costs millions and cannot be reused after a missile strike. A surveillance drone carries expensive sensors but is too slow to mimic a supersonic threat. Militaries operating on tightening budgets cannot afford separate fleets for training and combat missions.
What the SRC 100 Razor attempts is consolidation. The airframe weighs 330 pounds and incorporates a parachute recovery system that allows it to be retrieved after serving as a live-fire target. That same platform, reconfigured with different mission modules, can fly autonomous ISR sorties in contested environments. According to Sener, the drone maintains secure communications even in areas where satellite navigation is unavailable—a capability designed explicitly for operations against peer adversaries equipped with jamming systems.
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The basic function of the Razor, from a commander’s perspective, is operational flexibility. A single squadron could use the same airframes to train air defense crews in the morning and conduct border surveillance at night. The cost calculus shifts from expendable versus persistent to something more nuanced: an asset expensive enough to recover but inexpensive enough to risk.
Still, the achievement carries an honest limitation that Sener does not obscure. The SRC 100 Razor is a 150-kilogram UAV, placing it in the tactical rather than strategic class. It cannot carry the payloads of a MQ-9 Reaper or loiter for forty hours. Its stealth characteristics are designed to challenge contemporary surface-to-air missile systems, not penetrate advanced integrated air defenses. The company acquired Sistemas de Control Remoto, a Spanish autonomous systems developer, months ago to broaden its portfolio and increase production capacity. That acquisition was modest. Sener states it aims to double its space and defense production capacity with upgraded facilities, but scaling from prototype to volume manufacturing remains ahead, not behind.
What makes this matter, ultimately, is not the drone’s individual specifications. It is the signal that Spain intends to develop sovereign unmanned capabilities rather than purchase exclusively from established suppliers in the United States, Israel, or Turkey. Sener has positioned the SIROCO project as a long-term investment stream, with the Razor as the first deliverable. European defense industrial strategy has spent two decades discussing the need for indigenous UAV programs with mixed results. The Razor is not a competitor to the Eurodrone or the Anglo-French FCAS efforts. It is a lower-tier system, fielded faster, designed to capture a market segment those larger programs may never address affordably.
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The innovator of the Razor architecture is, institutionally, Sener’s Defence division, which has historically focused on naval systems and space infrastructure before pivoting to unmanned platforms. But the engineers who turned the concept into flying hardware are the former Sistemas de Control Remoto team, acquired specifically for their experience in autonomous flight control and lightweight airframe design. Rafael Orbe, who leads the division, provided the strategic direction; the technical execution came from engineers who had spent years building smaller tactical drones before being asked to scale up.
Reported by Sener’s official announcement from the World Defense Show 2026, the Razor is now entering the production readiness phase. The company’s stated goal is to double industrial capacity to meet potential demand once the drone formally enters the market. No launch customer has been named. No delivery timeline has been specified. What is clear is that Spain, which has historically relied on foreign suppliers for armed reconnaissance drones, now has a domestic alternative in development.
What comes next is the unglamorous work of certification, production engineering, and export licensing. The Razor must prove it can survive not just simulated threats but the rigors of military flight testing. Sener must demonstrate that its expanded facilities can deliver consistent quality at scale. The market for tactical UAVs is crowded, but most offerings are either too expensive to risk in target missions or too primitive for credible ISR work. The Razor occupies a middle space that few competitors have successfully held.
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For the rest of us, watching from outside the exhibition halls in Riyadh, the significance is quieter. A Spanish company, not a prime contractor, not a national champion, has built a stealthy drone that can be shot at in the morning and sent on reconnaissance in the afternoon. That is not yet a revolution in unmanned aviation. It is, however, evidence that the barriers to entry for capable drone development are lower than they were a decade ago. More countries can now build their own. Some of them will.
