Oshkosh Defense announced Monday a partnership with Silicon Valley startup Grid Aero to manufacture large military drones, which would be the first aircraft produced by the Wisconsin-based company.
“We do things that like gravity and stay on the ground,” said Logan Jones, Oshkosh’s chief growth officer, in an interview with Defense News, describing the company’s typical offerings. But he called the partnership “a very nice fit for us.”
Jones said the partnership grew out of the Defense Department’s Arsenal of Freedom campaign, which aims to expand the domestic industrial base. Grid Aero needed a partner to help scale production, while Oshkosh was looking to manufacture something with long-term potential.
“We looked where both the market was growing, and where the technology class would benefit from scale,” he said, explaining why the company has been exploring unmanned systems. Oshkosh was drawn to Grid Aero in part because its Lifter aircraft uses metal construction rather than composite materials, aligning with Oshkosh’s manufacturing capabilities.
Although Oshkosh would technically be considered a subcontractor, Jones said the companies describe the arrangement as a partnership because Oshkosh is helping Grid Aero reconfigure the Lifter aircraft “to ensure that manufacturability is at the heart of their design and strategy from day one, not an afterthought.”
However, Oshkosh wasn’t the only company making a decision. For Grid Aero, Oshkosh’s extensive experience in defense manufacturing helped solidify the decision to work together, co-founder and CEO Arthur Dubois said.
“They build vehicles by the thousands, and that is the rate we need. Their lines are also built for variety. A single Oshkosh line can build many variants of a vehicle, each set up for a different mission, without slowing down. Lifter works the same way,” Dubois said in an email to Defense News.
Founded in 2024, Grid Aero developed the Lifter, an autonomous aircraft with modular payload capacity that the company describes as a “pickup truck of the skies.” The Lifter falls into the Group 4 or Group 5 category of unmanned aerial systems, classifications that cover aircraft weighing more than 1,320 pounds.
Dubois said Oshkosh’s manufacturing technology is a good fit for the Lifter because it is “simple, rugged, piston-powered, and made from ubiquitous materials.” He added that the Lifter’s design “borrows as much from military trucks as from traditional aircraft.”
The companies plan to build thousands of Lifter aircraft for the Defense Department and commercial customers. Initially, Grid Aero will conduct low-rate production while Oshkosh establishes a pilot production line.
“As customer demand grows, we will move production to Oshkosh in stages and keep pace with what the customer needs,” Jones said. “As [the Defense Department] plans for future conflicts, the ability to field and replace aircraft at scale is one of the most important advantages it can build.”