Firestorm Labs raises $82 million to bring drone factories to the field

In a conflict in the Pacific, the nearest drone factory in the US is thousands of miles away. Ships and planes carrying components to the front line would be vulnerable to attack. Boot defense Firestorm Labs he believes the answer is a drone factory that fits inside a shipping container.

The company announced Wednesday that it raised $82 million in Series B funding led by Washington Harbor Partners with participation from NEA, Ondas, In-Q-Tel, Lockheed Martin, Booz Allen Ventures, Geodesic, Motley Fool Ventures and others, bringing its total funding to $153 million.

Firestorm didn’t start as a factory company. It started as a drone manufacturer, but when customers started asking to move production closer to the front line, the founders saw an opportunity to pivot.

Firestorm Labs CEO Dan Magy is a serial defense technology entrepreneur. Its co-founders bring complementary backgrounds: Chad McCoy is a career specialist business veteran and CTO Ian Muceus holds over a dozen patents in 3D printing.

The San Diego-based startup makes xCell, a container manufacturing platform that can print drone systems in less than 24 hours. Drones are not locked into a single purpose. Depending on what the mission requires, they can be configured for surveillance or electronic warfare, Magy told TechCrunch. When asked if the platforms are capable of lethal operations, Magy confirmed that they are. All platforms are delivered to uniformed operational commands of the Department of Defense, which deploy them in accordance with military doctrine.

It’s not just startups like Firestorm that are paying attention. The Pentagon has made contested logistics — keeping weapons and supplies moving under fire — one of only six national areas of critical technology. Firestorm generates revenue through hardware sales and government contracts across all branches of the US military. The Air Force contract is capped at $100 million, though only $27 million has been obligated so far.

The technology has already been used in the real world. Currently, two xCell units are being deployed in-house. one with the Air Force Research Laboratory in Rome, N.Y., and one with the Air Force Special Operations Command in Florida, Magy said. Firestorm declined to specify which units in the Indo-Pacific are using xCell, although the company says the platform is operational in the region.

Inside each xCell container is an industrial-grade HP 3D printer that prints the body and shell of each drone. Under the agreement, Firestorm holds a five-year worldwide exclusivity with HP to use industrial 3D printing technology in mobile development units, Magy said. The weapons themselves are not 3D printed and are added separately, according to Magy. The Army has also used xCell to print parts for a Bradley Fighting Vehicle on site, parts that would otherwise take months to procure, the CEO noted.

The problem is deeper than distance. Fixed production facilities are themselves targets, a vulnerability that Ukraine learned the hard way. And modern conflict moves fast. Lessons from Ukraine show that drone designs can change in days, not months, Magy said.

For Firestorm, the Indo-Pacific is the main event, where the company says the logistics challenges of modern conflicts are more difficult to solve. The startup aims for xCell to reach full operational growth there, “ideally within the next two years,” Magy told TechCrunch.