Ukraine's Fire Point turns to missile defense with FREYJA project

Fire Point and Germany’s Hensoldt signed a memorandum of understanding in Paris on June 16, 2026, to develop FREYJA, a Ukrainian-led air and missile defense system aimed at intercepting ballistic missiles. The project marks a sharp turn for Fire Point, a company founded in 2022 after Russia’s full-scale invasion and best known for weapons built to hit Russian targets rather than protect against them.

Fire Point’s long-range strike drones and FP-5 Flamingo cruise missile have already been used in attacks on Russian-held territory and inside Russia. Company co-founder Denys Shtilerman has said Fire Point-produced drones account for about 60% of Ukraine’s strikes inside Russia, a measure of how quickly the firm has become embedded in Kyiv’s war effort. FREYJA now pushes that experience into a far harder mission: stopping incoming ballistic missiles.

Under the agreement, Hensoldt is supplying the TRML-4D radar, while Fire Point holds overall design authority for the system. Hensoldt chief executive Oliver Dörre has framed the collaboration as a step toward a scalable European contribution to ballistic missile defense, tying Ukraine’s rapid pace of innovation to sensor technology, industrial scalability and system integration. Fire Point has said the effort is intended to support a broader European air and missile defense architecture, not just a single Ukrainian battery.

At the center of the project is the FP-7.x interceptor, which Fire Point says is being developed as a lower-cost effector with a target price below $1 million. Some reporting on the system has put the target closer to $700,000 per shot, pitching FREYJA as a cheaper alternative to Patriot interceptors at a time when Ukraine faces a shortage of those missiles and continues to absorb Russian drone and missile attacks. Defense reporting has described FREYJA as designed to engage a ballistic target at roughly 15 miles altitude.

The stakes go beyond one product line. If Fire Point can move from strike drones to missile defense, Ukraine would take a step toward building an independent air-defense capability instead of relying only on Western deliveries. For now, FREYJA remains a test of whether a company that has already proven it can help strike deep into Russia can also help close one of Ukraine’s most urgent gaps at home.