Two forces are changing the map of America’s defense sector at the same time, according to Andy Oare, a former Pentagon official who now sits at the center of the defense-tech ecosystem as founder of strategic comms firm BlueWing Impact:
The Pentagon is changing how it buys
Venture capital is pulling hundreds of new companies into the fight
Suddenly, founders need airspace, clearances, SCIFs, critical materials, and manufacturing capacity – and they need it faster than legacy hubs alone can provide.
The states adapting fastest could capture billions in CapEx and thousands of jobs.
To map the terrain, we spoke with an army of leaders on the modern defense industry’s front lines:
💪 The Heavyweight Champ – JP Nauseef, CEO of JobsOhio, on building the country’s most formidable defense manufacturing economy
🏔 The Frontier – Vector CEO Andy Yakulis on how Utah’s frontier spirit and big skies are powering defense tech innovation
🧠 The AI Industrial Engine – Pittsburgh AI Strike Team’s Joanna Doven on building secure communications workspaces next door to the Army’s largest AI-trained unit
🪨 The Critical Ingredient – Ferroglobe’s Bill Hightower on the U.S. silicon supply chain, from Appalachian earth to underpinning modern warfare
Plus insights from:
Savills’ Ken Biberaj, the go-to site selector for industries navigating the federal–local nexus
Walbridge’s Jamie Newell, with a ground-truth checklist for defense site selection
BlueWing Impact’s Andy Oare, on how the startup boom is reshaping defense
We cover it all in less than 7 minutes – we’re off next Friday so consider this a feast. 🦃
Let’s jump in.
Zach Silber
Editor-in-Chief, Standard & Works
💪The Heavyweight – Ohio
If there is a ground zero for America’s modern defense buildout, it’s Ohio, home to one of the country’s most sophisticated economic development engines: JobsOhio.
Across our reporting at Standard & Works – whether it’s life sciences, data centers, or mega-projects – Ohio is consistently cited as the state to beat – assertive, creative, fast, and backed by deep resources.
JP Nauseef, CEO of JobsOhio, puts it plainly:
“We win and we’re going to continue to win – with humility of course. We’re still humble midwesterners, but we’re not afraid to get in the trenches.”
A Playbook Shaped by Personal Experience
Nauseef understands how communities function when missions anchor the local economy.
He grew up in Ohio as a military brat. His father was an Air Force general. He later served as an Air Force officer himself.
Nauseef was pulled into economic development during the early 2000s, when Dayton’s Wright-Patterson Air Force Base faced a base realignment and closure (BRAC) review.
Ohio orchestrated a campaign that mobilized advocates, from the state’s federal delegation to local groups.
“ That's where I learned how connections and influence play a part, how locals play a part, how federal and state come together,” Nauseef says.
Wright-Patt didn’t just survive, it won – becoming a receiver of new missions.
Its population has doubled since.
“Missions are important because they bring jobs and they bring value, and that's good in itself – but the big prize is the industry that comes as a result,” Nauseef said.
The BRAC victory became the blueprint for Ohio’s rise as a national aerospace and defense powerhouse.
The front page from August 2005
How Ohio Wins
Ohio’s ascent was not guaranteed.
A decade ago, it was still shaking off the Rust Belt label.
JobsOhio has formally designated advanced aerospace and defense as one of its five “super sectors” – trillion-dollar opportunity areas where the state deploys its full arsenal of economic development tools.
Nauseef and his team have built a winning playbook to compete:
1. Land the Mission
“Proximity is what we’re selling,” he says.
Wright-Patt hosts an entire defense lifecycle:
Threat identification at NASIC
Research to oppose the threat at the Air Force Research Lab
Acquisition at the Life Cycle Management Center
Production with industry partners nearby
“The program managers at Wright-Patterson can walk down the street and work with their contractor. They can do that right here, in real time, very quickly,” Nauseef says.
2. Activate The Network
JobsOhio openly calls its aerospace and defense advisory board its “secret sauce.”
It’s a highly accomplished network of former military and NASA leaders who understand federal dynamics and can help win deals.
JobsOhio cultivates stakeholder relationships as a standing competitive advantage, Nauseef notes.
“You can't turn it on and off with a switch. It has to be real. And we've been at this for decades. With each victory you get more believers.”
The model traces back to the BRAC fight – when local, state, and federal leaders, including Gov. Mike DeWine (then U.S. Senator) and U.S. Sen. Jon Husted (then Ohio’s House Speaker) – came together to protect Wright-Patt.
3. Lift Up Communities
Ohio’s patriotic culture has resonated with Nauseef ever since he was a kid. Today he nurtures it as a workforce asset.
JobsOhio built the Hometown Heroes program to give veterans and their families access and recognition at major cultural, sports, and civic events.
It reinforces that their service is not only valued, but woven into the fabric of the state’s identity.
In return, it creates a love for Ohio among military members and families.
As Nauseef puts it:
“Employers love to hire veterans and veterans want to live somewhere that's affordable, where the population appreciates them, and where they can get involved.”
🏁 The Model in Action
JobsOhio’s strategy — land the mission, rally stakeholders, build the industry around it — has produced results:
Sierra Nevada Corporation (2022): Ohio initially lost the race for a major aircraft maintenance facility. But it didn’t relent. JobsOhio re-engaged the company with the help of an advisory board member and fought to flip the decision.
Joby (2023): Ohio wasn’t even on Joby’s site selection list. So they flew to California and muscled their way in. Now Joby is building blades in Dayton.
Anduril (2025): What’s now the largest jobs-creation project in Ohio history started as a 48-state search. By the time JobsOhio, Gov. DeWine, and then-Lt. Gov. Husted met the company, Nauseef said the pitch came naturally.
Anduril founder Palmer Luckey spoke to Bloomberg earlier this year about the site selection experience:
“As someone who is from California, there's some states that are really good at pushing you out and slowing you down, and there's others that are great at pulling you in and speeding you up. And that's what Ohio was.”
Watching from Washington, Savills executive managing director Ken Biberaj sees Ohio’s strategy as a winning playbook:
“It’s a perfect example of a community embracing the ethos of their ecosystem and being proactive and not reactive to target companies they want in their community.
“If you know the talent in your community is well-equipped, economic leaders should not sit back. They should go to those companies and get them to come.”
🚀 Ohio’s Next Mission
Ohio is now deploying its playbook to rally support around the state’s NASA Glenn Research Center – angling to anchor Lunar and Mars missions, and the industry ecosystems that come with them.
⛰️The Frontier – Utah
1,800 miles west of Wright-Patt, Utah represents a different kind of defense ecosystem.
Vector, a drone manufacturer and “modern-warfare-as-a-service” company, iterates its technology on six-week cycles informed by real-world battlefield lessons from Ukraine and Israel.
Vector’s model is designed to keep the United States government on the cutting edge of a rapidly changing environment.
Utah is wiring its defense economy to operate the same way.
CEO Andy Yakulis founded the company in Virginia after serving at the Pentagon.
“ Northern Virginia just didn't have that entrepreneurial vibe – that startup spirit. I was looking for an ecosystem that fostered that.”
A second-time founder, he contrasts Utah with his past experience in Silicon Valley:
“When you're building in Silicon Valley, it's very different. There's almost this rotational workforce that goes from startup to startup, and you don't see the collaboration between founders, between companies as much as you do here in Utah.”
“When people come to Utah, they stay. There's a mission and a purpose in certain values that people have here in Utah.”
Half of Yakulis’ team is prior military.
“They love the frontier spirit. They love the mountain air. They also love being outdoors.”
Vector immediately plugged into 47G, Utah’s statewide aerospace and defense organization.
“One of the first things I did when I moved to Utah was reach out to 47G to become a member because I wanted to be a part of this community.”
Why Utah works for Vector:
Proximity to major installations
Big open skies for testing
A culture and environment that attracts veterans and brings together entrepreneurs
🧠The AI Industrial Engine – Pittsburgh
If Utah is frontier energy and Ohio is mission proximity, Pittsburgh is becoming the AI nerve center of the modern defense landscape.
This summer, the AI Strike Team announced 6,000-sq-ft of secure communications workspace – known as SCIFs – at Bakery Square on the city’s AI Avenue.
Executive director Joanna Doven explained the significance:
“SCIFs are table stakes to even apply for an RFI with [DoW]. There are billions of dollars in contracts out right now – and we don’t have adequate SCIF space for our companies to even apply.”
The space – set to open in 2026 – sits next door to the Army’s Artificial Intelligence Center (AI2C).
“We have the largest federally trained AI unit in the nation right here – over 200 soldiers being trained on AI Avenue,” Doven told us.
AI talent + SCIF capacity + AI2C = a defense hub being constructed in real time.
💣 What It Takes to Be Defense Ready
To understand how defense companies choose locations, we spoke with Jamie Newell, a site selector at Walbridge who lives just outside Fort Bragg in North Carolina.
Newell’s checklist for defense site selection:
Workforce: Including security clearances
Sites that physically qualify: Places that can store munitions – including proper spacing between buildings and underground igloos for storage. SCIFs too.
Testing & training: Airspace, range access, and blast zoning.
Former WWII-era depots have become attractive, Newell says.
Texarkana, for example, is now a focal point for drone and munitions manufacturing as part of the emerging Sky Foundry program, precisely because Red River Army Depot already meets those stringent requirements.
“Munitions projects are looking at Texarkana because they have buildings that are positioned perfectly apart from each other.”
Newell also points to Laurinburg–Maxton Airport in North Carolina, which already has approvals to test drones.
“Wherever there’s blast zoning right now, wherever there’s a military base that’s allowing private companies to come in and test munitions – that’s where a lot of these projects want to co-locate.”
📍Places to Watch
Several locations surfaced repeatedly in our conversations – each with its own strategic role in the emerging defense landscape:
El Segundo, CA
A cluster of defense tech startups anchored by legacy aerospace, SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, and connectivity to San Diego’s military footprint down the coast. Several founders we met love “the gund.”
Austin, TX
A culturally magnetic hub with startups like Saronic (autonomous naval surface vessels) and OpsLab (air squadron operations software), Austin also has the Capital Factory, an accelerator that connects Texas entrepreneurs to D.C. stakeholders.
Capital Factory maintains an outpost in D.C.’s Union Market, giving founders federal proximity without needing a Beltway office.
Tulsa, OK
Tulsa is actively campaigning to be the Drone Capital of the World. The region has built a drone ecosystem to do it – from Skyway Range flight testing, to drone-as-first-responder deployments, to converting local manufacturers into drone suppliers.
Florida
Multiple assets anchor Florida’s defense base — Panhandle shipbuilding and aerospace, U.S. Central Command in Tampa, and spaceport infrastructure at Cape Canaveral.
Savills’ Ken Biberaj also pointed to Miami, which is home to eMerge, an annual dual-use summit for Florida with a similar goal as Utah’s Zero Gravity Summit.
Rhode Island
A quietly potent maritime-defense cluster, home to Anduril, VATN Systems, and HAVOCai – built on New England’s deep underwater-warfare heritage.
Huntsville, AL
Another week of Standard & Works reporting meant another round of Huntsville being name-checked in conversations – from its legacy aerospace roots to its PhD concentration, the city’s gravitational pull keeps widening.
🪨 The Critical Ingredient – America’s Silicon Chain
Along the Appalachian Mountains is something rare – a vertically integrated silicon supply chain.
Upstream of the blast zones, the test ranges, the hardwon manufacturing, and the vital missions are the nation’s critical materials.
Silicon is the physical substrate of modern warfare – a material embedded in nearly every modern defense system.
Bill Hightower, a former Alabama state senator and now VP of U.S. Corporate Affairs for Ferroglobe, explains:
“There are only two silicon metal producers in the United States. Ferroglobe is by far the largest.”
The company’s U.S. footprint isn’t by accident:
“Most of our facilities are along the Appalachian range – because of the abundance of water, cheap energy, and the geological formation of the quartz itself.”
Small-town America powers it, Hightower says.
“One of the delights of my job is that I get to go into plants where we have three generations of family that have worked there.”
At the source, the mining process itself is surprisingly regenerative:
“Farmers love us. We dig 20 or 30 feet under the soil and pull up quartz gravel. We wash it out, put the dirt back, and then take the gravel to our smelter. We are actually leaving the land better than when we found it – and that’s not just a tagline.”
Hightower is blunt about the stakes: if the U.S. wants strategic autonomy from China, it needs to secure the country’s silicon supply chain.
“Think how much more effective a drone can be if it’s lighter or if it performs better.”
“Silicon metal goes into things like gaskets for rockets, high-heat ceramic applications in engine turbines, and warfighter vests.”
It’s a reminder that the defense map goes beyond missions and startups – it’s also materials.
“I want people to understand the importance of silicon. It’s almost like gasoline in your car – you’ve got to have it in order to produce the things that we all enjoy.”
That concludes today’s tour. Of course, we will be covering this sector as it continues to evolve. In the meantime, have a great weekend and Thanksgiving.
