Never got impression that cartels were ‘technology creators’, they’d have to have tech partners - and what better partners than their drug and precursor suppliers?
You would be very extremely wrong. They have an intelligence division, a construction division. They literally have a mining engineering division. They have a financial unit. And yes, they have specialists in technology and drones. Think small country government and you aren’t far off.
Sounds like a “great” partnership for both, considering their goals.