Who Does Palantir Work For?

In 2024, the global revenue of Palantir, a data analytics company that works across a range of sectors including defense and surveillance, hit $2.9 billion - around 55 percent of which came from government contracts. The company saw a 28 percent increase in revenue in such deals year-on-year from 2023 and a 29 percent increase in revenue from commercial contracts, according to Palantir’s financial report.

Of its global revenue, 66 percent ($1.9 billion) came from the United States. This is up from the 62 percent share it accounted for in 2023, indicating that the U.S. is becoming an increasingly important player to Palantir. The United Kingdom is the next biggest purchaser of contracts, accounting for 11 percent of the global share in 2024, at just under $305 million. Palantir’s overall revenue increased around 29 percent year-on-year in 2024, earning an additional $640 million.

According to reporting by The New York Times, Palantir has received more than $113 million in federal government spending since U.S. President Donald Trump took office, in addition to a $795 million contract that the Department of Defense awarded the company in May, which has not been paid yet.

Palantir’s technology has been used across multiple sectors, including healthcare by the CDC and the UK’s National Health System. It is perhaps better known for its use in the defense, military and secret services fields, however. The software has been used around the world, including by Germany’s police and by NATO. Media reports also cite that its technology has been used “for most of the targeting” by Kyiv in Ukraine as well by Israel to target Palestinians in Gaza.

In the United States, the Department of Defense’s work with Palantir can be traced back to the so-called “War on Terror”, when Palantir’s software was used by U.S. military intelligence to predict locations of improvised explosive devices in Afghanistan. It is also used across other federal agencies, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). In April, the U.S. awarded Palantir a $30 million contract to create a surveillance platform called ImmigrationOS, intended to track undocumented people living in the U.S.