Invest1 publisher2 min readPublished
Korea's Cheongwang laser, now 90% local, runs at a quarter of HELIOS's peak power
South Korea's Hanwha Systems-built Cheongwang laser downed two of four drones at its public debut, at 10,000 to 20,000 won of electricity a shot. Its 30-kilowatt Block I is rated for small North Korean drones at two to three kilometres, a narrower job than the US and Chinese lasers it is measured against.
The Investor · Invest desk
What happened
- A Korean-made laser oscillator replaced the imported part in June, raising domestic content to 90% from 76% and lifting output by more than 50%.
- Engagement time against rotary-wing drones fell to one or two seconds from two to four, and against fixed-wing drones to a few seconds from more than ten.
- The US Navy has fired Lockheed Martin's HELIOS from the destroyer USS Preble and intercepted a target drone, according to The War Zone's reading of a Pentagon test report.
- Defense Express and other foreign outlets report that China's J-36 stealth fighter, still in development, will carry a combat laser able to intercept drones and cruise missiles.
Compiled by The InvestorSomething wrong?How this is made
Why it matters
- cost The 10,000 to 20,000 won covers electricity only; at the debut's two-in-four rate, with one shot per target, each downed drone used 20,000 to 40,000 won of power before any share of the system's price.
- exposure Imports now make up 10% of Cheongwang's content against 24% before June, and the core component is no longer among them; less of the program depends on a foreign supplier.
- contradiction Sedaily puts HELIOS's 120 kilowatts at six times Cheongwang's output, but its own 30-kilowatt figure gives four, so the article's ratio overstates the gap by half.
How far behind Cheongwang sits depends on which system it is measured against. Against HELIOS's 60-kilowatt rating, Block I has half the power [3]. Against the 120 kilowatts HELIOS can be raised to [11], it has a quarter [4]. The Chinese comparison rests on a J-36 laser listed in published material as "\*00 kW" [16], and even the 100-kilowatt floor of that reading is about 3.3 times Cheongwang [6].
Sedaily also wrote, of the 120-kilowatt figure, "That is six times the output of South Korea's Cheongwang air defense laser" [12]. The six fits an older Cheongwang [5]. Taken at face value, the Korean oscillator's more-than-50% gain in output [6] means the laser on the imported part ran below 20 kilowatts, and 120 over 20 is six [5]. If that is where the ratio came from, the June swap moved Korea from under a sixth of HELIOS's peak to a quarter [7].
I think the 90% matters more to Hanwha Systems than the 30. The company built the laser in a program led by the Agency for Defense Development, and it has been in service since late 2024 [2]. By Sedaily's account, no country had fielded and operated a military laser before South Korea did [9]. Its headline has China and the US both pushing lasers to hundreds of kilowatts [18]. The US figures in its own text stop at 120 [11], and Defense Express, the Ukrainian outlet behind the J-36 report, describes American ground and shipboard lasers as producing tens of kilowatts [17]. Sedaily does not describe an output target or a date for any version after Block I.
The counter-case is that output decides which jobs a laser can be sold for. Block I's rated target is small drones [8]. HELIOS is reported to destroy small boats and missiles as well, at up to eight kilometres [10], and the Navy plans to use it in place of its shipboard close-in weapon systems [13]. If buyers pay by that wider job list, a cheap shot at a narrow target set is the weaker offer, and the 90% is worth less to Hanwha than I am giving it credit for.
What to watch
- A unit price or production order for Cheongwang from Hanwha Systems or the Agency for Defense Development, the missing input for any cost-per-kill figure.
- An output rating and a date for a successor to Block I.
- Confirmation of the J-36 laser's rating beyond the masked "*00 kW" entry, or HELIOS entering Navy service at its 120-kilowatt setting.