Remember when we said everyone wanted a factory of the future? Well, looks like we were right. Yesterday, Alabama-based Performance Drone Works (PDW) announced the official opening of Drone Factory 01 in Huntsville, a “state-of-the-art” production facility that the company says will be able to churn out over 60,000 FPV drones a year.
The 90,000 sq ft facility is conveniently located near the US Army’s Redstone Arsenal, which happens to house the service’s largest contracting center. Honestly, pretty smart to be close to the people buying drones when you’re churning out thousands of them a month.
“The ever-evolving battlefield and global threat landscape demand reliable multi-mission unmanned systems capable of rapid production at scale,” PDW CEO Ryan Gury said in a statement. “Drone Factory 01 will allow us to produce these systems, deliver to operators in the field, and iterate as needed faster than ever before.”
Small but mighty: PDW was formed in 2018, born out of the Drone Racing League. In case you’re not familiar, the DRL was basically the F1 of drones—a high-speed racing circuit for small, speedy UAVs.
The company was officially incorporated in 2020 and raised an $8.6M seed round in 2024, according to PitchBook data. In March of this year, they closed a $16.4M Series A led by Squadra Ventures at a $132M post-money valuation.
The company makes two different drones:
- C100 Heavy-Lift Quadcopter: PDW’s flagship product, a medium-range reconnaissance quadcopter with a 10 lb payload and a range of about 6-9 mi. Its modular architecture means it can be easily updated to increase range or “impact” (hint: go boom).
- AM-FPV (Autonomous Micro FPV Drone): A teeny-tiny short-range FPV drone, designed for ISR and strike. It’s super small, super speedy, and easily packable. Think a racing drone, but ruggedized for military use.
The company has already been awarded several Army contracts.
- In September 2024, the service selected the C100 (alongside Anduril’s Ghost X) for the Company-Level Small UAS Directed Requirement, aimed at delivering agile, modular, squad-level drone capabilities. The award was structured as a 10-year IDIQ with a total value of $14.5M.
- In December 2024, PDW scored over $15.3M in contracts to field the C‑100 as part of the Army’s “Transformation in Contact” initiative. These are slated to be deployed across INDOPACOM, EUCOM, and CENTCOM.
Build up: The new facility will enable a significant ramp-up in production capacity, according to company leadership. At full tilt, Drone Factory 01 will be able to churn out 350 C100s and 5,000 AM-FPVs a month—a major increase from about 70 C100s a month earlier this year.
The company also says the factory will bring more than 500 jobs to Huntsville and generate $81M in annual economic impact.
“Today is the day the least number of drones will exist in the world—it’s all growth from here,” Gury said. “We’re confident that Drone Factory 01 will be a prominent contributor to the rapid production and adoption of small UAS on a global scale for both military and public safety operations.”