Former Mossad Director David Barnea has joined US defence technology company Ondas Inc. as Global President and Chairman of Ondas Defense Ltd., taking a senior role as the Nasdaq-listed group accelerates its expansion through acquisitions and investment in autonomous and security technologies.
Barnea’s appointment comes after Ondas raised about $2 billion from US institutional investors in 2025, with an option to increase the fundraising to $4 billion. The company has since used the capital to assemble a broader defence technology group through acquisitions, many of them involving Israeli companies, particularly within its autonomous systems business.
Ondas has a market value of slightly more than $4 billion. Its shares have lost about one-third of their value over the past six months but are up about 140% over the past 12 months. In early July, the company announced its largest acquisition by sales volume, purchasing DZYNE, a US company specialising in counter-drone systems and autonomous aircraft, in a deal valued at $875 million.
Barnea completed his five-year term as Mossad Director in June 2026, when Maj. Gen. Roman Gofman succeeded him as director. Ondas said his appointment received full approval from the Mossad’s legal counsel and is expected to comply with cooling-off period restrictions because Ondas Inc. is a US company and is not subject to Israeli security agency regulations.
The company said Barnea will support its global expansion, strategic technology development, government and defence relationships, and integration across its businesses. His responsibilities will include helping evaluate operational requirements, identify capability gaps, assess potential technology investments and acquisitions, and establish development priorities across the company’s growing portfolio.
Ondas operates through two business units, Ondas Networks and Ondas Autonomous Systems. The latter has an Israeli leadership team, with Oshri Lugassy serving as co-CEO. The wider group now encompasses approximately 20 acquired companies, alongside research and development and marketing teams.
The company is seeking to organise these businesses around four complementary areas: Aerial Security; ISR & Persistent Intelligence; Precision Strike; and Autonomous Ground Systems. Ondas says these capabilities are intended to operate through a unified AI-enabled software and command layer integrating intelligence, communications, mission planning, decision-making and coordinated operational execution.
Barnea brings approximately three decades of national security, intelligence, operational and executive leadership experience. Before entering public service in 1995, he worked in mergers and acquisitions at a leading Israeli investment bank. He previously served in the Israel Defense Forces’ elite Sayeret Matkal special operations unit and later earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the New York Institute of Technology and an MBA in finance from Pace University.
During his tenure as Mossad Director from 2021 to 2026, the agency underwent what Ondas described as a broad organisational and technological transformation, including strengthened intelligence, cyber, technological and operational capabilities and greater integration of artificial intelligence and advanced data technologies.
Ondas Chairman and CEO Eric Brock said Barnea brought a combination of operational experience, strategic judgement, technology leadership and global relationships that would be relevant to the company’s next stage of growth. Lugassy similarly said his experience would help Ondas connect capabilities across intelligence, communications, AI, autonomous systems and counter-UAS technologies.
The appointment comes as Ondas reports growing commercial activity. In the first quarter of 2026, the company reported revenue of $50 million, equal to its total revenue for all of 2025, while recording a loss of $10.9 million. It has also announced more than $70 million in new orders secured over a four-week period across unmanned ground systems, border security, counter-UAS, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and autonomous precision-strike technologies.
Ondas said Barnea’s position is entirely separate from his former public service. The company has no direct or indirect relationship with the Mossad, and Barnea will not use or disclose classified, confidential or otherwise restricted government information in his new role.
