AeroVironment is headquartered in Virginia, but has a presence in Cummings Research Park. Photo illustration: Cheng Xin/Getty Images
Defense tech firm AeroVironment is putting $20.2 million toward its Huntsville facility, the firm announced Tuesday.
The big picture: The government investment to expand its Cummings Research Park campus will increase Low-Rate Initial Production and accelerate Full-Rate production of its Freedom Eagle-1 counter drone missile.
The 24,000-square-foot addition will make the Huntsville site the "system-level integration, manufacturing and production hub" for the missile, "enabling rapid scale-up of interceptor production," AV says in the announcement.
What they're saying: ""Growing our presence in Huntsville places AV more firmly at the center of the Army's air and missile defense ecosystem," said Wahid Nawabi, chairman, president and CEO at AV, in the statement.
Nawabi called that proximity "critical," allowing for "tighter integration, faster iteration and more efficient production at scale."
Context: The Department of Defense is putting renewed focus on acquiring lower-cost drone interceptors, as cheap drones change the face of warfare across the globe.
AV says the Freedom Eagle-1 is a "low-cost, high-performance interceptor," that's been proved out in live-fire testing.
Catch up quick: This announcement follows on the heels of AV's $97.4-million contract with the U.S. Army to build GENESIS, a next-generation missile defense testing environment at Redstone Arsenal.
