Hadrian and Dirac are working together to allow aerospace and defense customers to produce weapons, cutting-edge defensive capabilities, and commercial products at speed and scale.
TORRANCE, Calif. and NEW YORK—Dirac, a developer of assembly automation software, and Hadrian, an advanced manufacturing company focused on “building the factories of the future,” are partnering to enable aerospace and defense companies to more easily tackle the challenge of manufacturing, assembly, and production at scale.
According to a release from Hadrian, the partnership will create an enterprise platform for “model-based manufacturing,” a new digital twin-inspired paradigm that brings real-world manufacturability context and tribal knowledge into the design process earlier. The platform is user-agnostic, reportedly enabling “any aerospace and defense company to accelerate all parts of the manufacturing lifecycle, from prototyping to large-scale production and assembly.”
The release stated that the United States produces the world’s most effective and capable weapons systems, and fielding those systems requires what the Department of Defense’s (DoD) National Defense Industrial Strategy (NDIS) called the “capacity to produce those capabilities at speed and scale.” According to the NDIS, “many elements of the traditional DIB [Defense Industrial Base] have yet to adopt advanced manufacturing technologies, as they struggle to develop business cases for needed capital investment.”
The Dirac-Hadrian partnership is said to bring the power of advanced manufacturing technology into reach for established companies, as well as new entrants.
Hadrian’s factories harness the power of robotics, artificial intelligence, and precision engineering to produce complex machined components for a host of commercial and defense customers. Dirac’s flagship product, BuildOS, automatically generates precise assembly work instructions directly from CAD files, enabling companies to quickly transition from design to production. Together, Hadrian’s production platform will integrate with Dirac’s to make a powerful model-based manufacturing platform any aerospace and defense company can use to supercharge its production.
“Every company in the U.S. Defense Industrial Base should have the ability to rapidly scale production and assembly to meet our near-peer threats,” said Chris Power, Hadrian’s CEO, in the release. “This partnership with Dirac will accelerate Hadrian’s ability to partner with companies as they bridge the gap from prototyping to scaled production. The DoD has made it clear it wants industry to enable companies to ‘make it at scale,’ and Hadrian is here to support companies on that journey.”
“This partnership with Hadrian is about more than just technology; it’s about securing America’s future,” said Filip Aronshtein, Dirac’s CEO, in the release. “We look forward to supporting new DoD programs with our digital platform, as well as assisting legacy programs to create model-based work instructions of their assembly and production processes to push the entire U.S. Defense Industrial Base forward.”
As part of this partnership, Dirac and Hadrian will continue to enhance BuildOS’s capabilities, developing new features to support even more complex assembly processes, and integrating real-time data analytics to optimize production. Hadrian will continue to expand its factory automation platform, exploring new technologies and methodologies that can be integrated with Dirac’s software to further strengthen America’s industrial base, the company said.
Hadrian said its mission is to transform the U.S. industrial base. It aims to do so by “building a series of highly automated, precision component factories to enable space and defense manufacturers to get parts 10 times faster and halve the cost of making rockets, satellites, jets, and drones.”
“By harnessing the latest in automation technology, artificial intelligence, and precision engineering, the company scales advanced machining to support customers in space, transportation, and defense,” the company said in the release. The company reported that it raised $117 million from top-tier investors in its Series B financing in February 2024.