Near Earth Autonomy, Inc.

Near Earth Autonomy, Inc., a small-business manufacturer of autonomous flight solutions and unmanned aerial systems, operates as a prime contractor on defense research and development work and as a subcontractor to larger primes on prototype development programs, competing predominantly under total-small-business set-asides across SBIR, STTR, and Other Transaction agreements. The company is headquartered in Homewood, Pennsylvania and bases its federal contracting strategy on autonomous navigation, sense-and-avoid systems, autonomous landing precision, and GPS-denied flight operations.

Near Earth Autonomy's prime footprint (75% of recent awards) centers on Department of Defense and civilian space-agency research contracts. Customer concentration by potential value is heavily weighted to Naval Air Systems Command, which accounts for $60.7 million across three awards anchored by two Other Transaction IDVs: a $31.1 million Aerial Logistics Connector (ALC) IDV awarded June 4, 2024, and a $29.6 million Medium Air Resupply Vehicle Expeditionary Logistics (MARV-EL) Increment 2 OTA awarded March 25, 2026, both structured with Consortium Management Group, Inc. as the primary consortia member providing OTA prime authority. The Department of the Army trails at $28.6 million combined potential value across six awards including an $11.5 million SBIR Phase II single-award IDIQ for the Rotorcraft Uncrewed Conversion Kit for Contested Logistics and Sustainment (RUCK) program running through April 2028, with two delivery orders issued to date ($999,839 Phase II RDT&E task order and $8.5 million enhancement task order). NASA Shared Services Center and the Department of the Navy Naval Air Warfare Center account for $6.2 million and $5.9 million respectively. By award count, the top customers are NASA Shared Services Center (12 awards, $6.2 million) and the Department of the Navy Information Warfare Systems Command (12 awards), followed by the Air Force Research Laboratory (9 awards, $4.1 million) and Navy Naval Air Warfare Center (6 awards). The top five customer organizations account for 65% of award volume and 84% of combined potential value.

Near Earth Autonomy's active vehicles are the Navy's IDV N66001-21-D-0037 (12 task orders), the Army's IDIQ W51701-25-D-A002 (2 task orders, $9.5 million combined potential), and the Air Force's contract FA86-16-14-D-6060 (1 task order). Representative recent prime work includes the MARV-EL OTA ($29.6 million) focused on autonomous resupply vehicle development under Middle Tier Acquisition authority, an $8.5 million Phase II SBIR enhancement task order from PEO Aviation for RUCK development (September 2025, completion March 2027), an $11.5 million RUCK-focused SBIR Phase II IDIQ (April 2025), a $2.9 million STTR Phase III definitive contract from Washington Headquarters Service to develop the CAPTAIN autonomy core with integrated human-machine interface (February 2025), and a $1.6 million SBIR Phase II contract from the Army for precision autonomous landing solutions titled "Assured Landing Location" (April 2025, completion October 2026).

Activity trajectory shows recent decline in award count—12 awards in 2023, 10 in 2024, and 9 in 2025—after building from three awards in 2022, with combined potential value across all 69 prime and sub awards reaching $121.1 million. The recompete cliff exposes three awards (combined potential value $12.7 million) completing within the next twenty-four months. NAICS concentration spans research and development in physical, engineering, and life sciences (51 awards across two related categories) and engineering services (12 awards). SCI-reportable invoicing totals $3.4 million across FY2023 and FY2024 ($1.4 million FY2023 across 11.8 FTEs, $2 million FY2024 across 11.6 FTEs), with government-paid hourly rates on federal service contracts running from $54/hr at the 10th percentile to a median of $83/hr to $108/hr at the 90th percentile; no sub-hours are reported in SCI prime contracts, indicating Near Earth Autonomy performs work with internal labor on the service contracts captured in the dataset.

Near Earth Autonomy subcontracts to larger primes on defense projects—DCS Corporation (Firefly autonomy system and Naval Research Laboratory optical science support, August 2025), Sierra Nevada Company on Broad-spectrum Wireless UAS prototype services (February 2025), Northrop Grumman Systems on B-2 technical services and advanced aircraft launch-recovery infrastructure (July 2024), and Alutiiq Information Management on Naval Research Laboratory laboratory equipment engineering services and restoration spanning multiple task orders (December 2023 through June 2024). The sub footprint represents 25% of recent awards and reflects Near Earth Autonomy's role as a specialized autonomy-systems provider integrated into larger defense platform and logistics development efforts.