Exclusive: Machina Labs plots huge robo-factory with $124 million raise
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Machina Labs raised $124 million and will use a significant chunk of the money to open a robotic manufacturing facility that will initially pump out missile structures and airframes, CEO Edward Mehr told Axios.
Why it matters: It's additional fuel for the reindustrialization fire.
- "We're going to see a reinvigoration of blue collar — but it's a different blue collar," Mehr said.
- It's now "enabled with robotics and iPads and things that allow them to be significantly more productive than just torquing the wrench over and over again."
Zoom in: The Intelligent Factory, as it's known, will be upward of 200,000 square feet and will be the company's first footprint dedicated to mass production. (Its two existing plants are less than half that size.)
- The new installation will likely not be built in California.
- "We've been talking with three different states," Mehr said. "New Mexico. We're talking with Texas. We talked with Alabama. Recently, Reno, Nevada, came into the equation."
Follow the money: Lockheed Martin Ventures, Balerion Space Ventures, Woven Capital and the Strategic Development Fund, based in Abu Dhabi and owned by EDGE Group, were involved with the Series C.
State of play: Machina has already worked with the Air Force.
- It's also coordinating with European and Israeli players.
What's next: The company's business is right now a 70-30 split of defense and commercial. But that could change over the next few years. Defense, Mehr said, is "very seasonal."
- "We're very patriotic. We want to make sure defense is supplied," he added.
- "But, at the same time, we need to make sure that we're smart about this. Like, if these factories are not doing defense items, they need to be automotive items, they need to be heavy equipment."
Go deeper: A "desire to build"
