Squadra News: $40M for Aurelius, $820M for PDW, UFORCE manufacturing in USA
Made in USA drone boats, laser systems, and component parts, invitation to events not to miss.
From our Metro Center office in DC, we had a front row seat to the celebration of America’s 250th birthday. In this month’s portfolio headlines you’ll see the pride.
UFORCE US became the first USV company endorsed by the Ukrainian government to build in America, trusting US manufacturers with Ukrainian IP and quality execution.
Aurelius Systems announced a partnership with American Rheinmetall. The collaboration will integrate the startup’s directed-energy counter-UAS platform with Rheinmetall’s robotic combat vehicles.
PDW was awarded the largest strategic financing issued to date by the Department of War’s Office of Strategic Capital. The funding will provide capacity to not only strengthen manufacturing resilience but reduce supply chain vulnerabilities.
While these are stories of technology and of funding, they are above all stories of partnership. They are also stories of America.
UFORCE’s drone boat production will aim to increase rapidly from 100s to 1000s per year; they’ll be built in Oregon and South Carolina.
Aurelius will grow from 13 to 50 employees in a matter of months, expanding their footprint in San Francisco, CA and opening a manufacturing facility in Detroit, MI.
PDW’s Drone Factory 01 in Huntsville, AL is one of the largest in the country, clocking in at 90,000 square-feet and over 350 full-time employees. The company’s engineering center of excellence is now hiring-up in Denver, CO.
Manufacturing in America means integrating innovative technology with next-generation hardware. Across our portfolio, we’re proud that it also means creating jobs and building communities.
In this edition you will find:
✨ Portfolio partnerships with Primes
🇺🇸 Visit to the White House, Capitol, and Pentagon
🚀 Upcoming events you can't miss
Company News to Celebrate
Aurelius Systems raised a $40M Series A round of financing co-led by Draper Associates and KAS Venture Partners. The company, which also just announced a partnership to integrate their counter-UAS platform on American Rheinmetall’s robotic combat vehicles and successful integration with Anduril’s Lattice at Project Jailbreak, will use the funding to further technical development, scale production, and make massive moves to hire and grow the team. Read more in Tectonic.
PDW received a conditional loan commitment of $820M from the United States Department of War’s Office of Strategic Capital. Aiming to close the drone production gap, this financing will enable PDW to establish high-volume domestic production component manufacturing capacity for drone platforms and autonomous systems. Read more from OSC.
UFORCE announced the expansion of manufacturing operations to the US. The Magura drone boats, which have run Russian warships out of the Black Sea, hit oil tankers, and shot down jets, will be manufactured by ReconCraft through a teaming agreement, aiming to make hundreds to thousands a year. Read more in the Wall Street Journal.
Launchpad hosted “World of Tomorrow," an exclusive summit to discuss the future of AI and robotics. Covered by Newsweek, the summit debated the realities of AI’s industrial future, noting opportunities for factory automation, humanoid robotics, workforce reconfiguration, and data control. Read more in Newsweek.
Nudge was featured in an article on the importance of browser-based shadow AI agent discovery. AI agents hold persistent permissions, which allows them to take action on their own. Without full indexing of what AI agents exist, they can not be monitored, let alone governed. Read more in Bleeping Computer.
Endolith was named a co-Principal Investigator on the Alaska Critical Mineral Accelerator, a recently funded program by the National Science Foundation. The company will apply its microbial technology to field-deployable bioleaching as an economical way to process critical minerals. Read more in Mining News.
Network Highlights to Share
Overwatch Imaging released the latest version of the company’s flagship AI-enabled sensor autonomy software. Built in collaboration with operators and refined through real-world missions, ASO 12.0 features a redesigned user experience, mission-focused workflows, and enhanced functionality for human-machine teaming. Watch the video.
Squadra Managing Partner Guy Filippelli spoke on a panel for the AUSA Army Acquisition and Contracting Hot Topic. Focused on accelerating capabilities for the warfighter through the Army Pathway for Innovation and Technology, Filippelli joined COL Shermoan Daiyaan, Director of Army PIT, Dr. Matthew Willis, Director of Army FUZE, and Shaun Moore, CEO of TERN. Watch the video.
PDW sent a delegation of team members to Ukraine. Led by Executive Chairman and Co-Founder Matt Higgins, the team met with operators, engineers, and manufacturers, gaining firsthand insights to inform the next generation of capabilities. Read the report.
UFORCE CEO Oleg Rogynskyy was featured in a segment on Bloomberg TV discussing how Ukraine is scaling autonomous systems, out-innovating others, and turning them into infrastructure militaries can rely on. As Rogynskyy said: "Once a system does what ours has done in combat, it becomes the one militaries build their programmes around." Watch the video.
Datalogz was named a Sample Vendor in the 2026 Gartner Hype Cycle for Data and Analytics Governance. The recognition reinforces the need to solve analytics sprawl within enterprise data environments in order to unlock the full potential of AI. Read the press release.
Tidal Cyber announced new capabilities that bring its threat-led defense platform into AI assistants and custom agentic workflows. These new capabilities are powered by the Tidal Cyber MCP Server, extending existing AI investments with trusted Threat-Led Defense intelligence. Read the press release.
Open Roles Across the Squad
🍋 Citra Space Corporation is hiring a Contracts Lead to own and scale the contracting function across the full contract lifecycle for commercial and government customers. Location: Colorado Springs, CO
🛰️ Falcomm is hiring a RF/mm-Wave GaN Power Amplifier Design Engineer to be part of a dedicated team of experts to design and develop RF power amplifiers for applications including SATCOM, Wi-Fi, and cellular. Location: Atlanta, GA
🤖 PDW is hiring a Head of Mechanical Engineering to build out a world class team of engineers to design a new category of tactical robotic systems and the industrial capacity to deliver them. Location: Denver, CO
⚓️ Overwatch Imaging is hiring a Maritime Product Owner to shape the maritime vertical for ASO and Smart Sensors leveraging industry expertise, serving as the in-house expert on maritime ISR missions and the voice of the operator. Location: Hood River, OR
🔥 Volund is hiring a Senior Software Engineer to build the company’s internal MES/QMS software that connects engineering, manufacturing, and quality operations, delivering seamless data flows and working full stack. Location: Huntington Beach, CA
Up Next this Month
Agentic Systems Engineering — 8/18: SpaceX's reusable launch system. The Replicator from Star Trek. Humans have never failed to imagine digital tools that produce physical systems to take us faster, further, and bigger than ever before. We've lacked systems engineering that scales across humans and agents. Join SysGit to learn how AI, SysMLv2 and Git combine to unlock tools, organizations and security boundaries. Register for the webinar.
Piper Sandler’s CEO Summit goes to Washington — 9/8: Bringing together public and private company CEOs, top investors, and operators from across the US and European defense technology and national security ecosystem, Piper Sandler is hosting the inaugural addition of their Government and Defense Technology CEO Summit. A few highlights from the program you won’t want to miss: Amy Gilliland (GDIT), John Mengucci (CACI), Dave Wajsgras (Everfox), John Serafini (HawkEye 360), Sean Plankey (UFORCE), Josh Araujo (Forterra), Shey Sabripour (CesiumAstro), Toby Magsig (Shift5), John Goodson (Darkhive), Matt Tait (ManTech), and our own Guy Filippelli. Note the name Brian White, friend of the Squad and the event’s host, to register through Piper Sandler.
Cyber guardrails for the AI era at Billington — 9/9: AI is transforming cybersecurity. On the offensive side, agentic and autonomous capabilities could become a powerful weapon to find new vulnerabilities and overwhelm organizations. This puts additional pressure on the defensive side, requiring integration between data, development, and security like never before. Join us for a panel discussion during the Billington Cybersecurity Summit. Register on Luma.
Loud and clear from Army FUZE — 9/10: The Army Demand Signal Forum is returning to DC, this time to the Hopkins Bloomberg Center. Aligning capability and capital, accelerating technology to contract, and next needs for innovation, will all be on the schedule of feature talks and presentations from Army leadership. The program is also accepting pitch applications. Companies with solutions related to contested logistics, long range fires, command and control, and autonomous systems, should apply ASAP. Learn more and register.
Meet Deep Tech in DC at the Startup Crawl — 9/10: One part science fair, one part bar crawl, one part scavenger hunt, one part networking event. Squadra’s proud to host the official Deep Tech Week Washington Startup Crawl. Interested in being an exhibiting company? Applications are accepted through September 2nd at 11:59 PM ET. Register on Luma.
Final Look from the Field
From the White House, to the Capitol, to the Pentagon, Squadra portfolio companies including SysGit, represented by CEO Steve Massey, and Overwatch Imaging, represented by Margaret Roth, participated in engagements across DC for the Annual Ark Strategy “Admin Day.”
Pictured here with Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary of War for Industrial Base Resilience Mr. Jeffrey Frankston, the group of 11 defense tech company leaders had conversations with representatives from the National Security Council, USSOCOM, US Navy, US Army, UK Ministry of Defence, Office of the Senate Majority Leader, Office of the Under Secretary of War for Research & Engineering, Office of the Under Secretary of War for Acquisition & Sustainment, and the Defense Innovation Unit.
Squadra Ventures is a venture capital firm led by founder-operators that invests in early-stage national security companies advancing the critical edge.
Grounded in the belief that success is a combination of people, product, and planning, the Squadra team provides transformational support to startup leaders in the complex dual-use technology ecosystem. By applying a growth-stage mindset at the seed stage and a commitment to building alongside entrepreneurs, Squadra empowers extraordinary teams to win and leave a lasting positive impact on the world.
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