Drone manufacturer acquires Manatee company, 12K-square-foot facility

A Jupiter company that makes drones has acquired an engineering and manufacturing firm in Manatee County, where it plans to produce structures for uncrewed aircraft. DarkMoth Group closed on the acquisition of Rapid Composites in July, the company announced Oct. 19. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Founded in 1999, Rapid Composites supports product development from concept through production by offering industrial design, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, software engineering, prototyping, tooling, carbon-fiber molding and production at its facility at 2216 72nd Drive E.

Rapid Composites owner Alan Taylor will join the DarkMoth Group as chief innovation officer, along with a team of designers and engineers, according to a statement. 

“Over 27 years, we revolutionized advanced materials and drone manufacturing,” Taylor says in the statement. “Now, I am proud to partner with this incredible team to scale our capabilities even further. We spent decades building the future, yet this next chapter is just the beginning.”

Following the acquisition, DarkMoth owns the machinery, tools, intellectual property and 12,000-square-foot facility where Rapid Composites operated. DarkMoth plans to use these resources to bring more of its production capability in-house as it develops uncrewed aircraft for American defense and U.S.-based law-enforcement customers.

“We build capacity before we need it,” DarkMoth CEO Chris Frerichs says in the statement. “This acquisition is part of that discipline — putting the equipment, tooling and manufacturing capability in place as we develop our aircraft, rather than waiting until an order arrives to start building the factory.”

DarkMoth is headquartered at The Lighthouse in Jupiter, Florida, where it has a 102,000-square-foot facility. The company was founded in August, a DarkMoth spokesperson says, and has plans to hire for its Manatee County facility.