Last week was Vendra’s first time exhibiting at Space Tech Expo USA in Anaheim.
It was the largest conference we’ve done as a company, and a real reminder of how far Vendra has come in a short time.
For the Vendra team, based in SF, it meant a week together in Southern California: an Airbnb, late dinners, event preparation, booth chaos, customer conversations, and all the while, the day job kept moving. We wouldn’t have had it any other way.
At the event itself, our whole team was there in person, talking with customers, meeting new teams, answering questions, running the booth, and bringing the energy, literally with free coffee, while still delivering customer orders throughout the event week.
The energy in the room was electric. Thousands of people across the aerospace and defense ecosystem were in one place: satellite builders, launch companies, suppliers, engineers, founders, operators, and manufacturers.
Everyone is building something impactful. Everyone is trying to move faster, without sacrificing quality. And everyone seemed to be thinking about the same core question: how do we turn ambitious hardware programs into real systems, real parts, and real production?
Over the course of the week, we met with existing Vendra customers already thinking about the next programs, builds, and parts we can help them with. We onboarded new aerospace and defense customers building satellites, launch vehicles, and mission-critical hardware. We also hosted a happy hour with the GroundControl team for customers and suppliers and recorded a podcast live from the floor with David Graff at RADICL, talking about everything from the birth of Vendra to the mission today.
After a week of great conversations, the biggest takeaway was this: the industry is moving incredibly quickly, but sourcing complex aerospace and defense parts is still harder than it needs to be.
Modern A&D teams are building satellites, launch systems, autonomous platforms, hypersonic vehicles, and new forms of defense technology at a pace the old manufacturing ecosystem was never designed to support. Timelines are getting tighter, requirements are becoming more complex, and the stakes are only getting higher.
And yet, too often, teams are still relying on fragmented supplier networks, slow quoting cycles, unclear capacity, and manual coordination to get critical parts made.
That gap is what Vendra is built to close.
We help mission-critical hardware teams source complex parts faster, with better supplier fit, higher quality, and less risk. Not by blasting RFQs to every shop in America, but by understanding the part, the process, the material, the inspection requirements, the timeline, and the supplier capabilities needed to get it made right.
Space Tech Expo was a reminder that the future of American aerospace and defense is being built right now. The companies in that room are not working on theoretical ideas. They are building the next generation of satellites, launch vehicles, defense systems, and space infrastructure.
They need a manufacturing ecosystem that can move at the same speed. That is the future we are building toward at Vendra.
Can’t wait to be back next year.
Vendra to orbit (and beyond).