Oklahoma's Unmanned Aerospace Future

The national lab for unmanned defense aerospace

A joint partnership between the Department of Defense, Oklahoma's research universities, and the companies building the next generation of autonomous air power. Modeled after JPL. Focused exclusively on unmanned systems for national security.

Department of Defense University of Oklahoma Oklahoma State University Ukraine UAV Sector Industry Partners
1,100+
Aerospace entities in Oklahoma
$44B
Annual aerospace economic activity
200K+
UAS procurement target by 2027
14
FAA-licensed spaceports (Burns Flat is one)
Core Mission

Four pillars of a new kind of defense laboratory

01

FFRDC Governance

Structured as a Federally Funded Research and Development Center, managed jointly by OU and OSU. The same model that gave us JPL, Lincoln Lab, and Sandia. Long-term government contracts. University talent pipelines. Institutional stability.

02

Defense-Exclusive Focus

No commercial drone delivery. No agricultural surveying. Every program, every dollar, every flight hour serves one mission: unmanned aerospace superiority for U.S. national defense. Focus is the multiplier.

03

Industry Integration

Kratos, Boeing, Northrop Grumman, General Atomics, and emerging defense firms collaborate on-site. Shared test infrastructure. Joint development programs. The gap between lab and production line collapses to zero.

04

Ukraine UAV Partnership

The world's most battle-tested drone operators and manufacturers as formal partners. Combat-proven tactics, rapid iteration cycles, and manufacturing scale that the U.S. defense sector needs but doesn't have domestically.

Partnership Structure

Government. Academia. Industry. International.

Government
Department of Defense — Primary sponsor and mission authority
Tinker Air Force Base — Adjacent testing and integration support
OK Dept. of Aerospace — State coordination and licensing
Academia
University of Oklahoma — Co-managing university partner
Oklahoma State University — Co-managing university partner, USRI expertise
Industry
Kratos Defense — Firejet, Valkyrie unmanned platforms
General Atomics — MQ-9, autonomous systems
Boeing / Northrop Grumman — Major defense primes
International
Ukraine UAV Sector — Combat-proven drone manufacturers and operators
Allied Nations — NATO-aligned defense technology exchange
Test Infrastructure

Two dedicated testing facilities in Oklahoma

Infinity One Oklahoma Spaceport

Burns Flat, Oklahoma

One of only 14 FAA-licensed spaceports in the United States. One of North America's longest runways. Purpose-built for military training, UAS testing, and advanced air mobility operations. Automated detect-and-avoid systems deployed.

Runway: 13,503 ft x 300 ft — 100-acre ramp — 6 hangars

Green Valley Farms

Oklahoma

Dedicated ground-level field testing facility for unmanned systems operations. Real-terrain environments for drone deployment, recovery operations, field maintenance protocols, and tactical scenario simulation under controlled conditions.

Field Operations — Tactical Testing — Recovery Protocols
Strategic Differentiator

The Ukraine advantage

Ukraine has become the world's leading innovator in military drone warfare. Their manufacturers plan to produce over 3 million FPV combat drones in 2026 alone. The U.S. built 300,000 in all of 2025.

SkyForge Labs formalizes this partnership on American soil. Ukrainian drone expertise, manufacturing velocity, and combat-tested iteration cycles integrated directly into a U.S. national defense laboratory. No other institution offers this.

The U.S. and Ukraine have already drafted a memorandum outlining defense cooperation on drone production and military technology. SkyForge Labs is the institutional home for that collaboration.

3M+
Ukrainian FPV drones planned for 2026
300K
U.S. drones built in 2025
10
Ukraine drone export centers in Europe
7M
Total Ukraine drone target for 2026

Where America forges its unmanned future

SkyForge Labs exists because unmanned aerospace superiority will define the next era of national defense, and the nation that builds the lab builds the future. Oklahoma has the ecosystem. The universities have the talent. The partners have the technology. The mission is clear.