Could AI- and robot-made missile components and airframes be the future of aerospace manufacturing? That’s the bet, Machina Labs CEO Edward Mehr said.
The Los Angeles-based company plans to break ground on its third manufacturing facility this year, Mehr told Defense One at the Space and Missile Defense Conference last month.
That facility, which hasn’t been named yet, is expected to be up to 250,000 square feet—more than double the size of Machina Labs’ two existing facilities.
The company builds large metal structures like airframes and drone bodies using AI and robotics with less specialized tooling and equipment.
“If you think about traditional metal structure manufacturers in defense, they have to go build a very custom factory for every product they want to deploy. There [are] facilitization costs that go for each product and then there’s a lead time associated with that. For us, the same factory that makes, let’s say, [Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile] fuel tanks, can switch and make UAV airframes.”
Last year, Machina Labs raised $124 million in a Series C round, much of which will be used for that third facility: “This year—and next—is about focus, about scale,” he said.
The company, which has Toyota, Nvidia, and Lockheed Martin as investors, plans to significantly increase production of its manufacturing system, RoboCraftsman.
“Today, we manufacture five of these manufacturing systems a year. We’re ramping that up,” he said.
Several of those systems are slated to outfit Machina Labs’ upcoming facility, which will produce cruise missile products. The company has not yet announced where it will be located.
“As long as you have a ground that can hold the system, they can be shipped to it, they open up, you connect them to power, and within the same day, they self-calibrate and start manufacturing,” Mehr said.
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Help needed: Natsec’s skilled trade crisis. For more than a generation, the rhetoric and overall advice for young adults mulling their future was to go to college, get a four-year degree, maybe learn to code, and land an office job—or at least one that is secure and not too dangerous. But that societal rhetoric may have helped fuel a dearth of skilled trade and craft workers, lawmakers and government officials argued during a pre-Labor Day hearing.
- “We assume that critical manufacturing inputs such as minerals, sub tier suppliers, [and] skilled labor will always be available. This assumption is false,” Rep. Ken Calvert, who chairs the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, said during opening remarks for a Sept. 4 field hearing on the industrial base. “According to the American Welding Society, approximately 20 percent of the welding force are approaching retirement and in 2025 they estimated the need for 320,000 new welders by 2029. These estimates are prior to the data center boom, which relies heavily on welders and fabrication.”
- The Pentagon’s head of industrial base policy Michael Cadenazzi echoed those sentiments in written testimony:
- “Decades of government policy and societal pressure have driven millions of talented young Americans towards degrees which haven’t delivered the benefits they were promised and have left defense manufacturers with few skilled workers waiting in the wings. There are as many as 400,000 unfilled skilled trades jobs in the DIB today, and that number could grow to 2.5 million by 2030.”
- Cadenazzi also highlighted the Pentagon’s award of a $10 million grant to BuildFreedom.us, which aims to bolster the skilled workforce by linking jobseekers with scholarships, apprenticeship programs, and “AI-proof jobs”.
- “We’ve now rolled out Build Freedom in three states, with plans to expand the program nationwide. This national awareness will drive individuals to our new Buildfreedom.US website, a one-stop shop where their interest can be converted into scholarships, training, credentials, and job opportunities,” he said of the effort, which was launched in partnership with the National Labor Exchange, Mike Rowe of “Dirty Jobs” reality TV fame, and his mikeroweWORKS Foundation.
- That $10 million grant will pay for more than 9,000 scholarships, Cadenazzi said.
Improving oversight of mishandled defense articles abroad. When the U.S. provides security assistance, the State Department is in charge of investigating incidents in which U.S. allies and partners fail to properly secure or transfer defense articles—from weapons to components or technical data. But the department’s “investigations, documentation and reporting on potential violations were inconsistent,” the Government Accountability Office wrote in a letter that was publicly released on Sept. 8.
- The watchdog agency made those concerns, which appeared in a 2025 report, a “high priority” issue for the State Department.
- “We recommended [the State Department] document the status and findings of its investigations and develop guidance for determining when to report an incident to Congress. Doing so could inform congressional oversight of future assistance,” the letter states.
Making moves + other news
- The Army picked Boeing and Anduril for its Integrated Fires Protection Capability (IFPC) Increment 2 Second Interceptor.
- Allen Control Systems is beefing up its manufacturing capacity with a new 191,000 square-foot manufacturing facility in Austin, Texas. The facility will churn out the company’s signature robotic turret.
- Kongsberg selected Echodyne to provide radars for its counter-UAS system.
- Former NGA Director Frank Whitworth is now president of Satellogic, a geospatial data company. Whitworth will lead the company’s operations and direct strategy for its defense and intelligence products.
- The Navy and MARTAC demonstrated refueling of autonomous vessels at sea.
- Ex-Pentagon weapons buyer Ellen Lord joined Chariot Defense’s advisory board with two former Army generals, James Rainey, who led Army Futures Command, and Samuel Peterson, the Army’s former buyer for combat support and sustainment portfolio. Defense investor Stephen Rodriguez also joined the board.
A final stray thought: BuildFreedom.us rings very similar to BuildSubmarines.com. Coincidence? Perhaps.
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