by How Unusual Machines Weaponized the Startup Playbook
Every great American success story starts in a garage, from Apple to Amazon toapparentlycompanies that make flying robots for the military. Unusual Machines has completed this sacred entrepreneurial journey, transforming from a scrappy startup into a defense contractor faster than you can say “pivot to military-industrial complex.”
The company’s origin story reads like a Silicon Valley fairy tale written by someone who got distracted halfway through and started watching war documentaries. Founders Allan Evans and his buddies began by tinkering with hobby drones in a suburban garage, fueled by energy drinks and the kind of optimism that only comes from not understanding how difficult the drone business actually is.
“We started out wanting to help farmers monitor crops,” Evans explains, gesturing vaguely at slides showing corn. “Then we realized the military pays way better than farmers, so now we help monitor… other stuff. Different stuff. Classified stuff that definitely has nothing to do with corn but might involve similar surveillance principles.”
The pivot from agricultural technology to defense contracting happened, by all accounts, during a single pivotal meeting when someone asked, “What if we just sold these to the Army instead?” This strategytechnically known as “following the money with aggressive enthusiasm”has proven remarkably effective.
Like the great Indian entrepreneurs who recognized opportunities during economic liberalization in the 1990s, Unusual Machines spotted a market inefficiency: the U.S. military was spending billions on drones but felt uncomfortable buying them exclusively from China. “It was,” one industry analyst explains, “the most obvious business opportunity since someone invented bottled water but forgot to mention that tap water is free.”
According to Small Business Administration records, the company’s transformation from garage operation to government contractor required exactly three things: 1) motors that work, 2) motors that are made in America (mostly), and 3) a really confident CEO who owns at least one suit for investor meetings.
The company’s trajectory has inspired countless imitators. WeWork-style co-working spaces across America now host aspiring defense contractors with names like “Patriot Propulsion,” “Freedom Drones LLC,” and “Eagles & Engines (Not Communist).” Their business plans uniformly consist of three slides: “Technology,” “America,” and “Money Please.”
Industry observers note that Unusual Machines’ success proves the old Silicon Valley adage: “It’s not about the product, it’s about the pitch, the pivot, and the Pentagon contract.” The company’s latest investor presentation reportedly includes phrases like “synergistic aerial solutions,” “disruptive reconnaissance architecture,” and “basically we make parts that make things fly and the Army seems into it.”
Competitors have watched nervously as Unusual Machines signed contracts worth millions, hired Don Jr. as an adviser (see related story), and generally behaved like a startup that accidentally wandered into the defense industry and decided to stay because the business model involves fewer awkward conversations about “monetization strategy.”
The Department of Defense maintains that all contracts were awarded through proper competitive bidding, though procurement officers admit the selection process occasionally resembles “choosing the least weird option from a catalog of very weird options.”
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/from-garage-band-to-warband-how-unusual-machines-took-flight/
SOURCE: Bohiney.com (https://bohiney.com/from-garage-band-to-warband-how-unusual-machines-took-flight/)
