From Florist To Drone Maker: How Ukraine’s War Democratized Military Technology And Sparked A Global Industry Boom
“It was just an obvious decision for me,” Kalmus told the BBC about her shift from florist to drone manufacturer after the invasion began. “I just wanted to help my country, help my people and the military.” Photo credit: BBC / Kseniia Kalmus
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Before Russia’s invasion, Kseniia Kalmus arranged flowers in Kyiv and traveled Europe showcasing floral designs. Today, she builds combat drones that destroy Russian equipment on the front lines. Her transformation from artisan to arms manufacturer encapsulates how Ukraine’s conflict has democratized military technology and triggered explosive growth in both drone production and counter-drone industries worldwide.
Kalmus’s journey reflects a broader revolution reshaping modern warfare. Ukraine has evolved from importing military drones to operating hundreds of domestic manufacturers producing millions of units annually, while Western nations scramble to acquire counter-drone systems as airports shut down and critical infrastructure faces unprecedented aerial threats.
Ukraine’s Civilian Army Of Drone Makers
The BBC reports that Kalmus made an immediate decision after Russia’s February 2022 invasion to help her country. Initially raising money for vehicles, medicine, and uniforms, she noticed frontline requests increasingly focused on one item: FPV (first-person view) drones.
“I realized that all the requests were for FPV drones,” Kalmus told the BBC. “So I started raising money for that, specifically, and then I decided to produce them.”
She now leads a volunteer workshop churning out hundreds of drones monthly—small quadcopters with plastic X-shaped frames that become lethal weapons when equipped with explosives. Her story parallels dozens of similar transformations across Ukraine, where teachers, artists, and taxi drivers have become drone manufacturers.
Before 2022, Ukraine had just a handful of drone companies. Today, hundreds of manufacturers operate across the country, with Kyiv claiming approximately three-quarters of Russian battlefield losses result from drones rather than conventional artillery.
“This has been the first full-blown drone war,” Stacie Pettyjohn, director of the defense program at the Center for a New American Security, told the BBC. “There are a ton of mom-and-pop shops in Ukraine where people are making drones and assembling them in their apartments, in their garages and donating them to the forces.”
Defense Contractors Capitalize On Battlefield Lessons
The Ukrainian drone revolution has transformed Western defense markets. US-based AeroVironment has seen its stock price soar more than fourfold since Russia’s invasion, while Portuguese drone maker Tekever achieved unicorn status in 2025 with a valuation exceeding $1 billion (£760 million).
Germany’s Stark is expanding operations with a new factory opening in Swindon, England at the end of November, while the UK government announced £4.5 billion ($5.7 billion USD) in spending on new military drones last year.
“The sector is growing really quickly,” Mike Armstrong, Stark’s managing director for the UK, told the BBC. “I think drones are the future of warfare. Legacy systems – artillery, tanks – they all have a place, but what we’ve seen is a major innovation which is not going away anytime soon.”
Counter-Drone Industry Experiences Parallel Boom
The proliferation of military drones has spawned an equally explosive counter-drone industry. Australian company DroneShield has seen its stock price surge 15-fold since 2022, becoming the only publicly-listed counter-drone company globally.
“We make hardware and software that you can carry in your hands, you can put on a vehicle or around the edge of a military base to detect and safely take down small drones,” DroneShield CEO Oleg Vornik explained to the BBC.
The urgency of counter-drone technology became apparent on November 7, 2025, when Belgium announced it was urgently seeking drone defenses after sightings forced temporary closure of Brussels Airport. The incident underscores how drone threats now extend far beyond active war zones.
DroneShield supplies not only Ukraine but also governments in the Asian Pacific region worried about Chinese surveillance drones, as well as Colombia and Mexico where criminal gangs deploy drones against law enforcement.
Norwegian startup Munin Dynamics is developing portable counter-drone systems that individual soldiers can carry.
“We’re building a system that every soldier, whether they are a newly mobilised Ukrainian or an experienced Nato soldier, can use to defend themselves from drones,” founder Magnus Freyer told the BBC.
Artificial Intelligence Represents Next Battlefield Evolution
Current military drones typically require human operators with remote controls within range of the aircraft, placing personnel at risk. Industry experts predict artificial intelligence will fundamentally transform drone warfare within years.
“That is going to be the next real shift,” Pettyjohn said. “Right now, really smart artificial intelligence is not very extensive. But you are going to start seeing groups of drones controlled by one operator, and then eventually fully autonomous drones that can collaborate.”
For Kalmus and thousands of Ukrainian volunteers, the work continues despite the personal toll.
“I miss flowers very much and I miss that previous life, of course,” she reflected. “A lot of my friends, me as well, changed totally, from flower artists or from dancers to drone producers. But this is a question of existence. We just fight for our country, for our existence, for our culture.”
DroneXL’s Take
We’ve been documenting Ukraine’s grassroots drone revolution since the invasion began, and Kalmus’s story represents a pattern we’ve covered extensively: necessity breeding innovation that completely outpaces traditional defense procurement.
We reported in April 2025 on Ukraine achieving 100% domestic FPV drone production, with former barista Andrii Yukhno running a basement workshop producing 100 drones monthly. In April 2024, we profiled Magdalyna, another 27-year-old florist who transformed her home office into a drone workshop and raised over $200,000 for components.
The scale is staggering. Ukraine now deploys approximately 9,000 drones daily and produces over 4 million units annually. This grassroots manufacturing ecosystem has proven so effective that American defense contractors are now learning from Ukrainian basement workshops rather than the other way around.
The counter-drone boom the BBC describes is equally dramatic. We covered Belgium’s airport crisis just days ago, where German military counter-drone systems were deployed after multiple shutdowns at Brussels and Liège airports. The incident demonstrates how drone threats now affect NATO countries far from active combat zones.
What makes Ukraine’s transformation remarkable isn’t just the production volume—it’s the complete inversion of traditional military-civilian technology relationships. Florists, bartenders, and artists are now manufacturing weapons systems that outperform expensive Western alternatives at a fraction of the cost. Ukrainian $400 FPV drones routinely outperform $100,000 American Switchblades in peer warfare conditions.
This democratization of military technology raises profound questions about the future of defense manufacturing and warfare itself. If civilians with online courses and garage workshops can produce combat-effective drones, what does that mean for traditional defense contractors and procurement systems? And as Pettyjohn notes, when AI enables fully autonomous drone swarms, how will the counter-drone industry keep pace?
The human cost remains central. Kalmus and thousands like her didn’t choose to become weapons manufacturers—they were forced into it by existential necessity. Their flower shops and art studios became drone factories because the alternative was occupation or worse.
What do you think about civilians becoming military manufacturers? Share your thoughts in the comments below.