The AeroVironment plant in Petaluma, Sonoma County, California, that builds aerial drones for an East Coast defense and law enforcement contractor plans to trim its local workforce further than cuts disclosed earlier this year.
In a March 6 state filing, AeroVironment said that it plans to permanently lay off 62 from its Petaluma location by May 6. This includes the 17 job cuts noted in a WARN Act filing last month would come by April 25, a spokesperson for the Arlington, Virginia-based company confirmed.
The March 2nd statement reads:
“With the recent shifting of U.S. DOD funding away from medium UAS company-owned, company-operated (COCO) operations, AeroVironment made the difficult decision to reduce the number of employees directly operating these sites located outside the U.S., along with some support staff. Approximately 80 employees were impacted across the organization, in both Petaluma, CA, and within our MUAS Field Service Organization.
“The outlook for the rest of AV’s business – including for our MUAS business outside of COCO services – remains strong with the recent selection of AV as one of the providers for FTUAS increment 2 program, and the award of a sale of systems as part of the U.S. Military Aid package to Ukraine.”
Altogether, the reductions include 30 drone operators, 22 mechanics, four on-site managers and one each for these roles: flight operations, field safety manager, program scheduler and standards operator, according to the filing.
These job cuts will reduce the Petaluma workforce to about half the 120 employees that a spokesperson said it had as of February.
As the company told the Business Journal in a statement about the first round of local cuts last week, the layoffs result from a recent shift by the Department of Defense away from funding company-owned, company-operated (known in the federal contracting world as COCO) medium-sized unmanned aerial systems, or MUAS, outside the U.S. That led to around 80 jobs being cut in Petaluma and in the company’s MUAS field service group.
The company early this month reported that MUAS revenue in its fiscal third quarter, ended Jan. 28, declined by $5.8 million from a year before, while quarterly sales of small UAS jumped $45 million.
In 2021, AeroVironment acquired Petaluma’s Arcturus UAV, a privately held provider of unmanned aircraft systems and services, for $405 million, including $355 million in cash and $50 million in AeroVironment stock. Founded in 2004, Arcturus had about 270 employees at the time.
Arcturus Jump 20
Some of AeroVironment’s drones are being used in Ukraine in it defense against Russia. AeroVironment is also the maker of the helicopter being used by NASA on Mars.
On March 6, the publicly traded drone maker reported a loss of $676,000 for the third quarter, but it was in the black for the same period last year.
Revenues for this period were $134.4 million. AeroVironment expects annual revenues to range between $510 million and $525 million.
AeroVironment continues to be a favorite vendor of the federal government, which is a key reason the company moved its headquarters in 2021 from Southern California to be closer to the Washington, D.C., area.
The Army’s selection of AeroVironment for the second part of the Future Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System program includes the Jump 20 vertical take-off and landing medium-sized UAS. Earlier this month, the company touted the use of the Jump 20 drone in the Ukraine–Russia conflict.
Top Photo: D’Milo Hallerberg, CEO of Arcturus UAV, checks the guidance system in one of his company’s drone aircraft, Wednesday Jan. 27, 2010, in Rohnert Park. (Kent Porter / Press Democrat) 2010
Source: North Bay Business Journal