Aevex Aerospace, LLC

Aevex Aerospace, LLC, operating through its Aevex Flight Operations division, is a for-profit limited liability company based in Solana Beach, California that delivers full-spectrum airborne intelligence solutions, flight operations, and advanced aerospace engineering services to the Department of Defense and national security agencies as a prime contractor on full-and-open and non-set-aside vehicles. The vendor competes exclusively in unrestricted markets without leveraging SBA set-asides, holding a 76% prime-to-24% subcontractor split across 125 recent awards with combined potential value of $56.92 billion.

Aevex's capability footprint centers on intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) operations, specialized aviation services, sensor development, prototyping, test and evaluation, logistics, maintenance, flight operations, and advanced aerospace engineering. The vendor anchors its customer relationship on the Air Force's classified BIG SAFARI program—a rapid-prototyping initiative for airborne reconnaissance capabilities—where it holds a single-award $1 billion Basic Ordering Agreement with Air Force Materiel Command's Aeronautical Systems Center (awarded April 17, 2024, through April 16, 2029). Recent representative work under BIG SAFARI includes a $892.8 million firm fixed-price delivery order (December 2, 2024, through September 30, 2026), a $39.7 million delivery order (February 14, 2025, through February 13, 2027), and a $30.4 million delivery order (August 31, 2023, through June 30, 2025). Beyond BIG SAFARI, Aevex delivered an $8.8 million definitive contract to Army Corps of Engineers' Engineer Research and Development Center (October 1, 2025, through September 30, 2030) for range support and force protection technology testing at Roswell, New Mexico, and a $4.3 million delivery order to Army PEO Simulation, Training and Instrumentation for small unmanned aerial counter systems under the Aerial Target Systems 3 vehicle (June 23, 2025, through April 15, 2026).

Customer concentration is acute and skewed toward classified Air Force programs. The Aeronautical Systems Center accounts for 63 awards and $9.23 billion in combined potential value (40% of total dollar value despite comprising 50% of awards by count). When measured by dollar potential, the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center at Eglin Air Force Base dominates with two awards carrying $46 billion combined potential value—the Eglin Wide Agile Acquisition Contract (EWAAC) fourth on-ramp awarded March 13, 2025 (through September 9, 2031, $46 billion ceiling) and the OASIS+ Unrestricted GWAC awarded April 15, 2025 (through April 14, 2030, with a multi-billion-dollar ceiling). These two vehicles alone represent 81% of Aevex's total potential-value footprint. By award count, the Air Force Materiel Command's Lifecycle Management Center and Air Force proper follow distantly with 17 and 9 awards respectively; Navy Naval Air Systems Command and the Office of the Secretary of Defense contribute $289.9 million and $255.4 million respectively. The 21 distinct customer agencies served across the portfolio mask extreme concentration: 78% of awards fund Air Force programs, and the top five agencies represent 100% of combined potential value.

Aevex maintains positions on multiple government-wide vehicles and agency-wide IDIQs. The $1 billion BIG SAFARI BOA (Aeronautical Systems Center) supports 22 task orders worth $1.21 billion combined potential value. The $46 billion EWAAC at Eglin (awarded March 13, 2025) and the multi-billion-dollar OASIS+ Unrestricted contract (April 15, 2025) enable ordering across Air Force and federal agencies broadly. A single-award indefinite-delivery contract from PEO Enterprise Information Systems (August 28, 2024, through August 27, 2029, $47.9 million ceiling) has generated two delivery orders—the $13 million Air Mobility Command "AVX" development and engineering order and $3.5 million PEO EIS RDTE work. Naval Air Warfare Center's RAPID MAC MA-IDIQ delivered a $40.2 million delivery order (September 5, 2023, through September 4, 2028, cost-plus-fixed-fee, later deobligated). Aevex also holds a $95.1 million multiple-award Indefinite Delivery Contract with Army PEO Simulation, Training and Instrumentation for aerial target systems engineering and field support (awarded September 16, 2024, through September 15, 2029). GSA awarded Aevex positions on both the ASTRO GWAC (November 15, 2021, through November 14, 2031, multi-billion-dollar ceiling) and the Missile Defense Agency's SHIELD contract (January 21, 2026, through December 28, 2035, $151 billion ceiling), the latter a new multiple-award vehicle for multi-domain defense capabilities. A January 27, 2026 Basic Ordering Agreement with Army Contracting Command-Redstone Arsenal for drones and drone components (through January 8, 2031) reflects the vendor's recent expansion into unmanned systems procurement under Executive Order 14307.

Activity trajectory shows growth acceleration: 9 awards in 2022 rising to 31 in 2025, with 7 awards in the first three months of 2026. Nine awards with combined potential value of $964.5 million reach ultimate completion within the next twenty-four months, creating significant recompete exposure, particularly on near-term BIG SAFARI delivery orders and army contracts.

Aevex operates primarily as a prime contractor but maintains an active subcontractor presence. The vendor subcontracts to Sierra Nevada Corporation on multiple BIG SAFARI-related efforts (services, aircraft parts, gram-based systems, CLS support, GOCO operations, and U-28 aircraft logistics dating from 2022 through December 2025); to Technology Service Corporation on ISR mission operations and crew services for Law Enforcement Agency operations (September 2025 and August 2024); to Brtrc Federal Solutions on Naval Special Warfare programs (January, May, and August 2025); to HII Mission Technologies on munitions science and technology R&D and autonomous aerial logistics integration (May 2025); to Matrix Research on wideband integrated digital-receiver development (April 2025); and to Dzyne Technologies on flight operations support (January 2023). Sierra Nevada represents the dominant prime relationship, accounting for roughly two-thirds of named recent sub-awards and spanning classified BIG SAFARI work, aircraft sustainment, and supply-chain support. The subcontractor footprint reflects Aevex's role as a specialized flight operations and ISR service provider feeding into larger primes rather than the converse. Service Contract Inventory data is sparse—SCI captures only 6 records (1 prime, 5 sub) across FY2022–FY2024 with zero reported invoiced revenue under the prime designation, reflecting heavy concentration of Aevex work in classified contracts and delivery orders that fall outside SCI's $150,000 reporting threshold for non-classified service contracts; FTE trajectory visible in SCI shows 28.9 FTEs in FY2022 and 73.0 FTEs in FY2024 (subcontractor positions), but this figure represents only a narrow slice of the vendor's federal delivery footprint.

Aevex maintains a subsidiary, Veth Research Associates, LLC, a for-profit limited liability corporation. The corporate structure supports the vendor's positioning as an integrated airborne solutions provider capable of engineering, flight operations, and field support delivery across classified and unclassified defense programs.