At Palantir’s Developer Conference, AI is Designed for Military Success

On a brisk March morning at an undisclosed hotel in the mid-Atlantic, Palantir’s developer conference unfolds. The defense contractors, military personnel, and corporate leaders present are caught off guard by the weather, having expected the previous day’s mid-70s warmth to continue. A cold rain quickly transitions into steady snowfall, prompting Palantir to distribute heavy blankets. As attendees navigate between open-air pavilions, they appear as if they’ve just escaped from shipwrecks. Still, the atmosphere remains buoyant. This self-selecting crowd is convinced that Palantir is delivering on its promises, reflected in the company’s soaring stock price. The gathering buzzes with the exuberant groupthink typical of a multilevel marketing event.

After managing to secure an invitation to the conference—made difficult by Palantir’s discontent with WIRED’s recent coverage—I was keen to gain insight into this enigmatic company. Founded in 2003 by Peter Thiel and his then little-known former Stanford classmate Alex Karp, Palantir has become integral to the Pentagon’s AI-driven combat transformation. However, its most significant growth in recent years has come from the commercial sector. “The commercial business is growing at 120 percent year over year. We’re very proud of the 60 percent growth in government, but they’re not even close to the same trajectory,” explains Palantir’s CTO, Shyam Sankar, who is also part of a four-person team of tech executives serving as lieutenant colonels in the Army Reserve.

Generative AI has significantly contributed to Palantir’s ascent, supercharging the hands-on support the company offers its clients. In its early days, Palantir embedded “forward deployed engineers” within organizations to integrate its software into their workflows. The advent of large language models empowered Palantir to enhance its products, allowing engineers to focus on assisting clients in developing their own tools with Palantir’s technology. “Every time those models improved, it felt like they were tailor-made for us,” says Ted Mabrey, an early employee now leading the commercial division. Sankar adds, “Our entire philosophy has been to build Iron Man suits for cognition. We were previously limited by the number of people and the creativity of the inquiries, and with Gen AI, that limitation was lifted, dramatically altering our growth rate.”

The morning’s keynote speakers include a US Navy vice admiral overseeing the Maven AI battlefield initiative, alongside executives from Accenture, GE Aerospace, SAP, and the Freedom Mortgage Corporation. This diverse lineup reflects the company’s evolution from defense work to the commercial realm. During breakfast, I observe a presentation from a family-owned fashion business with 450 employees. CEO Jordan Edwards of Mixology Clothing discovered Palantir through an Instagram advertisement and asserts that the AI-driven system has revolutionized his business operations. He utilizes Palantir’s software for purchasing decisions, which then automates emails for price negotiations. “For one line we sell, it drove a 17-point margin swing—from losing $9 a unit to gaining $9 a unit,” he confidently states. Edwards now refers to himself as a “forward deployed CEO.”

While Palantir’s primary growth lies within the commercial domain, its essence is rooted in defense contracting. Throughout its lengthy battle to gain acceptance in the defense sector (including a lawsuit against the Army to be considered for a contract), the company cultivated a focus on outcomes. Palantir believes this journey instilled a level of rigor that has propelled it ahead of its competitors in the commercial field. A chapter in Sankar’s newly published book, Mobilize: How to Reboot the American Industrial Base and Stop World War III, is titled “The Factory Is the Weapon.” Both Sankar and CEO Alex Karp assert that American industry, particularly in Silicon Valley, has demonstrated a lack of patriotism. They hope Palantir’s model will motivate other corporations to produce national defense products alongside their consumer offerings.

Karp’s opening remarks at the conference underscored how the company’s defense work shapes its identity, particularly now that the U.S. is engaged in conflict. Wearing an atypical blazer (“This is to convince my family I have a job,” he jokes), he notes that usually he would be discussing ways to enrich and satisfy commercial customers, helping them outshine their competitors. He refers to rivals as “noncompetition,” believing they don’t measure up to Palantir’s standards. However, with active warfare in Iran, the company’s chief focus has shifted to supporting troops. “At Palantir, we were designed to give our warfighters … an unfair advantage,” he declares. “We were all about truly defeating our enemies, and I take immense pride in that.”