Safety First

Godspeed Godspeed

4 weeks ago

4 MIN READ

Welcome

Happy Saturday folks. Welcome to The Godspeed Weekly!

Markets remain risk-off – caught in a turbulent tape.

During the down days, it’s important to remain focused on our objective.

We have the ingredients of a new Industrial Revolution, but it’s up to us to innovate responsibly.

The greatest hurdle to welcoming the new future is not speed or efficiency – it’s safety.

If we fail to deliver safe innovation, the feedback loop will eat itself.

But if what we build is more safe than what’s widely available, the feedback loop will accelerate at Godspeed.

Onward…

Safety First

Waymo shared its latest Safety Impact study, capturing 50M+ miles of data through December 2024.

As of today, the company operates fully autonomous rider-only services in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix and Austin.

Waymo

Let’s dive deeper into the data of Waymo’s largest two markets – Phoenix and San Francisco.

Compared to an average human driver, Waymo witnessed —

83% fewer airbag deployment crashes
81% fewer injury causing incidents
64% fewer police reported accidents

These figures are required to attract the Early Majority.

Safety first.

Waymo

Kratos Goes Hypersonic

Kratos

Kratos Defense $KTOS ( ▼ 2.81% ) is building a hypersonic drone. Details including design, performance and timeline are classified, but the news inspires nonetheless. The company’s CEO, Eric DeMarco even teased the idea of air-breathing propulsion technologies – leveraging oxygen in the atmosphere to generate thrust.

Hypersonic speed typically refers to flight between Mach 1 and Mach 5. At Mach 5 – a vehicle may circle the Earth in 6.5 hours. NYC to London in less than an hour.

Kratos has the support of the US Department of Defense. In January, the company secured a $1.45B DoD contract to develop testing capabilities for hypersonic weapons. The 5 year agreement will support the Multi-Service Advanced Capability Hypersonic Test Bed (MACH-TB) program. Leidos (LDOS), Rocket Lab (RKLB) and Stratolaunch were tapped as contractors for MACH-TB.

Boeing Bull Rejoice

United States Air Force

The aerospace and defense giant received a $20B contract to develop the United States Air Force’s Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter jet.

Boeing’s selection caught many by surprise, upsetting aerospace and defense rival Lockheed Martin.

Aircraft design specifics remain classified, but it is anticipated to exhibit low-observable stealth shaping, adaptive propulsion systems for greater range and performance, and the capability to operate alongside autonomous drones.

The 6th generation stealth aircraft is set to replace Lockheed Martin’s F-22 Raptor as the premier air fighter in the 2030s.

President Trump confidently commented,

The F-47 will be the most advanced, most capable, most lethal aircraft ever built.

Let The Charts Speak

Risk is starting shift. We track a handful of ETFs likely to be effected by the ensuing industrial revolution.

The iShares US Aerospace & Defense ETF stands out.

It’s the only ETF returning a positive 1-month performance and rests above its 20D, 50D and 200D moving averages.

Aerospace & Defense is in the spotlight. The group is exhibiting signs of relative strength – while the news narrative favors the space.

Here’s the weekly chart.

Jensen Huang’s iPhone Moment

In case you missed it, Jensen Huang + NVIDIA just had its Steve Jobs + iPhone moment…

The AI rockstar took center stage at NVIDIA’s GTC AI 2025 keynote, announcing the company’s latest and greatest.

Key moments of the keynote include — generative compute, Agentic AI, AI Factories, self-driving technology, the computer for the age of AI, robots and much more.

Click here to see our comprehensive coverage.