Ethan Thornton

About

Ethan Thornton founded Mach Industries at 19 after dropping out of MIT, building a vertically integrated American weapons manufacturer focused on unmanned systems and hypersonic-adjacent propulsion. Backed by Sequoia, Khosla Ventures, and Bedrock, Mach raised a $100M Series B in 2025 and is scaling Forge Huntington, its 115,000 sq ft Huntington Beach factory producing the Viper VTOL UAV, Glide, and Stratos under U.S. Army contracts.

Previous roles

• Energy-systems work, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
• Founder and operator of a woodworking and metalworking business begun in high school

Notable work

• Led development of Strategic Strike/Viper, a vertical-takeoff precision-strike aircraft that Mach moved from design kickoff to full-performance wingborne flight in 14 weeks
• Built Mach's portfolio of asymmetric defense systems, including Viper, Glide, Stratos, Pike, Dart, and propulsion capabilities
• Led Mach's Venom program with Divergent, moving from concept to first flight in 71 days

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