Key Factors
- Divergent Applied sciences and Mach Industries launched the Venom autonomous strike plane prototype developed from idea to flight readiness in 71 days.
- The venture demonstrates speedy plane growth utilizing digital manufacturing and modular techniques aligned with U.S. missile and drone acquisition efforts.
Divergent Applied sciences and Mach Industries introduced on Feb. 17, 2026, in Los Angeles that they’ve collectively launched Venom, an autonomous strike plane prototype developed and dropped at flight readiness in 71 days, demonstrating speedy {hardware} growth enabled by digital manufacturing and modular system design.
In keeping with a joint announcement from the businesses, the Venom plane serves as a flight demonstration platform designed to indicate how protection {hardware} can transfer from idea to operational prototype utilizing software-driven engineering and manufacturing strategies. The venture combines Mach Industries’ system structure and avionics integration with Divergent’s digital manufacturing know-how.
The prototype was developed utilizing a modular open-systems structure established by Mach Industries, which leveraged avionics and simulation instruments derived from present flight-proven know-how stacks. Divergent executed the digital design and additive manufacturing of the plane’s main construction, together with wings, fuselage, skins, and management surfaces, producing them as monolithic assemblies quite than conventional multi-part aerospace constructions.
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“This partnership between Mach Industries and Divergent demonstrates a pivotal functionality for the nation. By combining Mach’s revolutionary techniques with Divergent’s revolutionary digital manufacturing platform, we’ve moved from idea to a flight-ready prototype in 71 days,” mentioned Alex Lovett, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Battle for Mission Capabilities within the Workplace of the Underneath Secretary of Battle for Analysis and Engineering. “This isn’t simply a formidable metric—it’s a direct enabler of our technique to attain inexpensive mass and help the SECWAR’s ‘Drone Dominance’ imaginative and prescient. ODASW(P&E) is dedicated to sponsoring collaborations like this that speed up speedy acquisition and ship pressing, low-cost munitions to the warfighter.”
The businesses mentioned Venom was enabled by Divergent’s Adaptive Manufacturing System (DAPS), a producing strategy that replaces advanced multi-hundred-part assemblies with unified additively manufactured constructions. As famous by the corporate, this course of reduces total half counts whereas accelerating manufacturing timelines and simplifying manufacturing workflows.
“Going from inception to flight in 71 days is a transparent demonstration of what’s attainable when Divergent’s Adaptive Manufacturing System is utilized from day one. That is what manufacturing on the velocity of relevance appears like,” mentioned Lukas Czinger, co-founder and chief govt officer of Divergent. “Most significantly, Divergent will drive the speedy scale-up of this technique, producing 1000’s of airframes yearly. Partnering with Mach has been a direct win and displays two mission-aligned, revolutionary corporations executing at most tempo.”
Mach Industries established baseline system necessities and performed iterative testing utilizing a shared simulation and management framework that allowed {hardware} and software program growth to proceed concurrently. The businesses mentioned this parallel engineering mannequin enabled accelerated validation cycles and lowered the timeline between preliminary design and first flight.
“During the last 18 months Mach has taken 4 merchandise from idea to flight take a look at by means of speedy iteration, and Divergent’s adaptive tech stack has been instrumental in accelerating that iteration,” mentioned Ethan Thornton, founder and chief govt officer of Mach Industries. “Mach’s choice for a manufacturing contract is the primary of many alternatives to indicate not solely velocity to prototype, however velocity to scaled manufacturing.”
Venom represents a prototype autonomous strike plane meant to exhibit speedy acquisition ideas quite than an introduced operational deployment. The platform integrates autonomous flight functionality with scalable manufacturing strategies geared toward producing airframes extra rapidly than conventional aerospace packages.
