近距离内射合集

Castelion Corp., a California defense contractor building a 1,000-acre campus in Rio Rancho, announced Thursday it raised $1 billion in its latest fundraising round.

Much of that money will be pumped into its Project Ranger campus, where Castelion plans to start manufacturing its hypersonic missile, Blackbeard, by next year, said Andrew Kreitz, co-founder and chief financial officer.

Currently, Kreitz said, some 300 construction employees are working at the site, which includes roughly 20 buildings. The site is on track to be operational by year鈥檚 end, when hiring is expected to ramp up, Kreitz said.

Kreitz said he expects Castelion to exceed hiring commitments it made to the state. By the end of 2027, as many as 300 employees will be working on site, he said.

鈥淲e鈥檙e excited to start interviewing people and to start creating a lot of jobs in the area,鈥� he said.

The company鈥檚 thesis is that it can produce mass quantities of the missiles at low cost. The $1 billion in financing will accelerate the scale and production of Blackbeard at the Rio Rancho site, according to a company announcement.

Castelion has committed $250 million for the first two phases of its manufacturing campus, and the additional financing will allow it to invest in the third and fourth phases, Kreitz said.

鈥淪o we鈥檒l be adding additional capabilities, some buildings, and that鈥檚 going to allow us to drive up the production rate of Blackbeard,鈥� Kreitz said. 鈥淭he other thing it鈥檚 going to let us do is accelerate development of our second product, our much larger, much longer-range system. And that will include some development and early production capabilities that will also be at Project Ranger.鈥�

The fundraising round values Castelion at $13 billion. Over the past 18 months, Castelion has secured roughly $500 million in contracts with the U.S. military.

The ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and Iran have strained the U.S. munitions supply. In April, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth told a congressional committee that President Donald Trump鈥檚 鈥渉istoric鈥� budget request of $1.5 trillion for the Department of Defense will supercharge U.S. defense industrial capacity.

鈥淥ver the past year, through historic, multiyear procurement agreements that this committee supported, we have cut smart business deals that have sent unambiguous demand signals to industry to build more and build faster,鈥� Hegseth said. 鈥淭he result has been a surge, a revitalization of our great American factories and massive reinvestment in the skilled American workers who serve as the industrial muscle behind our warriors.鈥�

Hegseth said his department has helped stimulate more than 250 private investment deals in 39 states with 150 different companies, creating more than $50 billion in investment. The result, Hegseth said, has been 280 new or expanded facilities and 70,000 new jobs.

Castelion鈥檚 $1 billion Series C fundraise includes $800 million in equity financing and $250 million in committed financing from a revolving credit facility. Investors in the deal include: JPMorgan Chase & Co.; Andreessen Horowitz; funds managed by global investment firm Carlyle; Lightspeed Venture Partners; Lavrock Ventures; Altimeter; General Catalyst; Interlagos; and T. Rowe Price Associates Inc.

Kreitz said of hypersonic missiles that, 鈥淔undamentally there鈥檚 no intrinsic reason that these have to be as expensive or difficult to manufacture as they historically have been.鈥�

鈥淚f you use the right engineering approach, you鈥檙e sort of optimizing for scale and cost,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd that is what we are optimizing for. I guess that is part one of the thesis. Part two of the thesis is you do need a lot of these. And I think that鈥檚 been proven out by recent conflicts from Iran to Ukraine to elsewhere.鈥�

Justin Horwath covers energy and tech for the Journal. You can reach him at jhorwath@abqjournal.com.