Preston Fore here. Landing a defense contract has historically meant navigating layers of government bureaucracy, with proposals often taking years to turn into cash. But software unicorn Code Metal is getting something new defense contractors rarely get from the Pentagon: speed.
The Boston-based firm just landed an $80 million contract to modernize and AI-enable WarMatrix, the Department of War’s wargaming simulation environment, Fortune learned exclusively. The process only took less than 12 months.
“I have never seen them move this fast, and that’s been really exciting,” CEO Peter Morales told Fortune, adding that after securing $17 million for the initial operating capability—the minimum version of the system that can be usefully deployed—they received the full funding as an Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreement.
Code Metal—which builds AI-powered software to translate code across programming languages and verify that it works on different types of hardware—was valued at $1.25 billion in February, when it secured its $125 million Series B, led by Salesforce Ventures.
The deal comes as venture-backed companies race to turn investors’ enthusiasm for defense technology into actual government business. It also reflects a broader push to bring the Pentagon’s vast, decades-old software infrastructure into the AI era.
