Hadrian has a short client list, but it is not an easy one to get on. The Pentagon and Lockheed Martin Corp. are both customers, and the startup just raised $1.37 billion to finance a significant hiring expansion.
The round is a Series D, the name for a late-stage fundraising step. JPMorgan Chase's Strategic Investment Group anchored the deal, which Hadrian announced on Thursday, August 6, 2026.
The round values Hadrian at $7.87 billion.
That is up from the $1.6 billion valuation it had earlier this year. Bloomberg News had already reported the round was being discussed before Hadrian made it official.
Hadrian is six years old, and the latest round shows how much demand military customers are creating. The investor list includes Baillie Gifford, Valor Equity Partners, Andreessen Horowitz, Founders Fund, and 1789 Capital, where Donald Trump Jr. is a partner.
The startup has grown alongside a broader effort to rebuild America's defense industrial base. Its work on munitions and submarines has helped turn a young manufacturing company into a major military supplier.
CEO Chris Power called the new money "more fuel on the fire" during a conference call. "We've got a lot of company building to do," he said, and the plans back that up.
Get the free Always Be Buying eBook and learn the simple system for building wealth on any income
The company expects headcount to reach roughly 2,000, nearly three times its current level. The jobs will be spread across four states within 12 months.
In practical terms, that means more people to build the things the Pentagon is asking for. Power said the new capital will fund hiring and training to fulfill future Pentagon orders.
Hadrian also has an overseas push on its calendar. Before the year is out, the company expects to have staff on the ground in Australia, Asia, and Europe. Those outposts are designed to support overseas manufacturing and NATO allies, a sign that demand reaches beyond the United States.
At home, Power said San Francisco will get a new Hadrian engineering and research office, and two additional factory sites will be chosen by year-end. The expansion already has a running start: earlier this year, the company opened an Arizona plant for aerospace and defense clients.
The company also announced its fourth plant in Alabama for submarine work with the U.S. Navy. It formed an alliance with the U.S. Army in Texas and plans to make Torrance, California, its new headquarters, a site where Hadrian already operates.
One important detail: the cash from this round won't pay for the factories themselves. A separate credit line will cover construction, machinery, materials, and other capital costs.
Power expects to announce that credit line in the coming weeks. He says the company will use that same structure for all future projects.
Hadrian is not the only defense startup collecting big checks. Private investors put roughly $35 billion into defense-tech startups in the first half of this year, a record for that period, according to PitchBook.
That level of cash is a sign that big money expects military demand to stay strong for years. It is also flowing to both software-led companies and manufacturers like Hadrian, and the broader build-out points to a long runway for defense work.
A lot of that money is going to startups using AI, robotics, and similar technologies to change how wars are fought. Hadrian is working on the manufacturing side, with Power's focus on helping the Pentagon make more munitions and submarines.
Power does not expect a public stock offering, an IPO, until 2029 or later. An IPO is when everyday investors can finally buy into a company, so that timeline matters to anyone watching Hadrian from the outside.
Hadrian is still private, so most everyday investors cannot buy its stock today. The bigger story is the wave it is riding: governments and private investors are putting serious money into defense, and that wave is likely to keep rolling for years.
Private rounds like this are not usually open to individual investors. But the trend behind them is public: defense spending is climbing, new factories are being built, and young companies are lining up for government work.
That is the part that could reach your portfolio even if Hadrian never does.
Download the free Always Be Buying eBook and start putting your money to work today