As the Pentagon tightens restrictions on foreign materials entering American defense supply chains, two U.S. companies are joining forces to manufacture high-performance drone batteries sourced entirely from domestic materials.
Global Ordnance Holdings, a Florida-based defense supplier, and California battery manufacturer Sparkz Inc. have signed a master supply agreement initially targeting 210,000 battery packs beginning early in 2027.
What makes the partnership particularly significant is that the drone batteries supplied by Sparkz will be manufactured domestically from 100% U.S.-sourced materials and components, according to the companies.
The agreement, signed during the Association of the United States Army’s 2026 annual meeting, comes as the Pentagon is ramping up drone procurement and the Trump administration is tightening restrictions on materials from foreign entities of concern entering American military supply chains.
“Sparkz battery packs are fully produced in the US with a fully domestic, non-FEOC supply chain,” Sparkz founder and CEO Sanjiv Malhotra told Metal Tech News in an email.
Under the agreement, Sparkz will manufacture and supply the batteries, while Global Ordnance will lead sales and distribution through its established defense network.
The companies expect batteries to become available in early 2027, with full manufacturing capacity targeted for the second quarter.
From policy to production
The partnership comes three months after President Donald Trump signed an executive order aimed at closing loopholes that have allowed defense contractors to bypass domestic and allied suppliers of materials critical to America’s military readiness.
The July 20 “Securing America’s Defense Supply Chains and Ensuring Domestic Acquisition of Critical Materials” order directs the Pentagon to tighten restrictions on foreign-sourcing waivers and establish a system for tracing the origin of materials and components entering U.S. defense supply chains.
Beginning Jan. 1, waivers for certain covered materials will face tighter restrictions, with exceptions requiring contractors to demonstrate efforts to secure compliant materials and present plans to eliminate noncompliant sources.
The order also directs the Pentagon to develop requirements for tracing critical supply chains from raw materials through the finished products delivered to American warfighters.
In August, the White House took a more targeted approach to the growing importance of unmanned aircraft systems, issuing a proclamation aimed at reducing America’s dependence on imported drones and their components.
The Aug. 13 proclamation specifically identified American drone manufacturers’ reliance on foreign-produced lithium-ion batteries, electric motors, and other essential components as a national security vulnerability.
Against this backdrop, the Sparkz-Global Ordnance agreement represents an effort by private industry to establish a domestic alternative to the supply-chain vulnerabilities identified by the White House and Pentagon.
Batteries built for the mission
While Sparkz has largely focused on establishing an American supply chain for lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, the company is taking a more flexible approach to the batteries it will manufacture for Global Ordnance.
Malhotra said Sparkz intends to tailor both battery chemistry and configuration to the operational demands of the aircraft being powered.
These requirements include aircraft weight, payload capacity, mission duration, duty cycle, and peak current demands.
This approach would allow Sparkz to manufacture batteries designed around the needs of individual drone platforms rather than relying on a single battery chemistry for every application.
“The first contract from Global Ordnance to Sparkz is for Group 1 FPV drones,” Malhotra told Metal Tech News.
Group 1 unmanned aircraft systems are the smallest category under the Pentagon’s classification system, typically weighing less than 20 pounds.
First-person-view (FPV) drones in this category allow operators to navigate an aircraft using a live video feed from an onboard camera, a capability that has become increasingly important in modern military operations.
Although the initial contract focuses on these smaller aircraft, Malhotra said the technology is scalable to larger unmanned systems, with plans to expand the program across Groups 1 through 4, the latter encompassing aircraft weighing more than 1,320 pounds.
That flexibility could become increasingly important as the Pentagon expands its fleet of unmanned aircraft performing everything from short-range reconnaissance to longer-duration missions requiring greater power and payload capacity.
Sparkz Inc.
Sparkz is developing an American supply chain for its domestically manufactured lithium batteries.
Bringing battery minerals home
For Sparkz, establishing a domestic battery supply chain began well before its partnership with Global Ordnance.
The Sacramento-based company has been developing a vertically integrated American manufacturing ecosystem for LFP batteries, which use lithium, iron, and phosphate rather than the nickel- and cobalt-bearing cathodes found in traditional lithium-ion batteries.
LFP technology has gained considerable market share in recent years due to its relatively low cost, long cycle life, and improved thermal stability.
While the technology eliminates the need for nickel and cobalt in the cathode, it does not remove the need for critical minerals or the specialized processing infrastructure required to convert raw materials into battery-grade components.
This processing challenge is particularly significant given China’s dominance across much of the global lithium-ion battery supply chain.
Sparkz has been working to overcome this challenge by establishing domestic production of LFP cathode active material at its Sacramento facility.
In 2025, the company reported achieving improvements in the compressed powder density of its domestically produced LFP cathode material, increasing volumetric energy density while lowering potential battery cell manufacturing costs.
Earlier this year, Sparkz announced a $20.2 million Series A financing round to help establish a second U.S. manufacturing facility and scale production of LFP cathode materials.
While these investments have largely focused on LFP technology, Malhotra’s comments indicate the company is positioning its battery manufacturing capabilities to accommodate different lithium-ion chemistries based on military requirements.
The company’s commitment to domestic sourcing, however, extends beyond battery chemistry.
“The raw materials, cells, and all other components are domestically sourced and free of a FEOC-controlled or influenced supply chain,” Malhotra said.
FEOC, or foreign entity of concern, is a designation applied to suppliers with ties to China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.
Establishing a supply chain free of these foreign influences is one of the challenges facing American battery manufacturers seeking to supply military equipment.
Sparkz’s objective to domestically produce the drone batteries it plans to deliver into U.S. defense supply chains via Global Ordnance entirely from American materials aligns closely with the Pentagon’s efforts to establish greater transparency and security throughout the materials supply chains supporting American military equipment.
Powering America’s drone ambitions
The agreement comes as the Pentagon moves to rapidly expand its fleet of unmanned aircraft through initiatives such as the Drone Dominance Program.
This expansion will require more than manufacturing the drones themselves.
Batteries must deliver sufficient power and energy density to support demanding military applications while meeting the increasingly stringent sourcing requirements imposed on American defense contractors.
“Putting more drones into service requires a dependable supply of the components that keep them flying,” said Global Ordnance President Jeffrey Brunozzi.
The Florida-based defense contractor’s partnership with Sparkz aims to address both challenges by combining domestic battery manufacturing with an established defense supply and distribution network.
The companies say their batteries will comply with applicable National Defense Authorization Act requirements, although the announcement does not specify the particular sourcing provisions involved.
The partnership, however, does represent a commitment to establish an American alternative to foreign battery supply chains at a time when the Pentagon is increasing its focus on both drone production and the origins of the materials used to manufacture military equipment.
Sparkz’s endeavor to establish a fully domestic supply chain for unmanned military aircraft offers an example of the mine-to-manufacturing connections needed to translate America’s critical mineral resources into the advanced technologies vital to both the nation’s economy and security.
Author Bio
Shane Lasley, Metal Tech News
Shane Lasley is the founder and publisher of Metal Tech News, where he covers the minerals, metals, and materials that make modern technology possible.
A journalist with nearly two decades of experience covering mining and mineral development, Lasley has expanded his reporting beyond where metals come from to explore what makes them valuable — the unique properties that allow elements such as lithium, rare earths, graphite, gallium, germanium, copper and dozens of others to enable advances in energy, transportation, electronics, aerospace, defense, and emerging technologies.
His reporting follows the entire materials story, from mineral discovery and mine development through processing, supply chains, materials science, and the technologies that ultimately put those resources to work.
Lasley has a particular interest in critical minerals and the increasingly interconnected relationship between mineral resources, technological innovation, energy security, global supply chains, and geopolitics. Through Metal Tech News, he seeks to give readers a deeper understanding of the materials behind innovation and why securing their supply matters.