Trive Capital Partner Tanner Cope (left) and Dr. Marco Villa, CEO of Canopy Aerospace & Defense [Photos: Apogee]
Dallas-based private equity firm Trive Capital has announced the formation of Canopy Aerospace & Defense, an advanced materials provider designed to solve “the most complex technical challenges on preeminent defense and commercial platforms.”
The new company is the result of the combination of two manufacturers in suburban Los Angeles—Hera Technologies and MSM Industries—with Canopy Aerospace, an emerging R&D center of excellence based in Littleton, Colorado.
Trive said Canopy A&D delivers highly specialized materials with exceptional insulative, absorptive, and signal-reducing characteristics, enabling platforms to move “faster, cooler, and quieter—underwater, in air, and in space.”
The combined company operates five facilities in markets including Los Angeles, Denver, and Cape Canaveral. It’s purpose-built to assist OEMs from the initial design phase with R&D material and system engineering services to turnkey manufacturing through refurbishment services on reusable platforms, Trive added.
‘Reusable rockets, space vehicles, submarines, and more’
“Hera and MSM are two incredible manufacturers of signature-reducing advanced materials that insulate some of the world’s most iconic platforms,” Trive Capital Partner Tanner Cope said in a statement. “The consumable nature of these materials created the opportunity for both companies to deeply integrate with their customers via refurbishment services throughout the lives of these reusable rockets, space vehicles, submarines, and more.”
“The addition of Canopy Technologies’ extensive engineering team is responsive to customers’ requests for more front-end design and engineering services,” Cope added, “and we’re eager to meet that need to create a faster path from concept to fielded capability.”
Former SpaceX mission operations director named as CEO
DFW-based Dr. Marco Villa has been named CEO of the newly formed Canopy Aerospace & Defense. Twelve years ago, Villa served as mission operations director at SpaceX, where he managed Dragon spacecraft missions. A founding partner at Ceresio Consulting, his other posts have included EVP and chief revenue officer at Terran Orbital; founder, chairman, and CEO of Tvak International; and founder and partner at mv2space.
Villa said he’s “excited to work collaboratively with the founders and employees at Hera, MSM, Canopy, and Trive to execute on our collective vision to solve a glaring gap in the A&D supply chain.”
“At its core, Canopy is committed to systems thinking and forward innovation—not just one-off products, but integrated solutions that embed directly into customer missions,” Villa added in a statement, “By partnering with Canopy for their advanced materials’ needs, our customers are freeing up valuable resources to focus on their core differentiating technologies,”
Trive said the new company’s engineering capabilities and manufacturing footprint benefit from a comprehensive set of OEM approvals, extensive proprietary IP, classified facilities, and sole-source positions on critical space vehicles, maritime, and related defense systems.
With more than $8 billion of regulatory assets under management. Trive said it focuses on investing equity and debt in what it sees as strategically viable middle-market companies with the potential for transformational upside through operational improvement.
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