Africa’s most heavily funded defence technology startup, Terra Industries, is expanding its manufacturing footprint with a new 34,000-square-foot drone factory in Accra, Ghana, in what the company says will become the largest facility of its kind on the continent once operational in June 2026.
The facility, called Pax-2, marks Terra’s first production site outside Nigeria and more than doubles the size of its existing 15,000-square-foot factory in Abuja. The company says the new plant is designed to scale output to about 50,000 drone units annually by 2028, as demand for unmanned aerial systems continues to rise across security and industrial sectors in Africa.
The expansion comes at a time when drone warfare has become increasingly prominent in the Sahel, where armed groups linked to al-Qaeda and Islamic State have intensified their use of unmanned systems. Between 2023 and 2025, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) reportedly carried out dozens of drone operations across Mali and Burkina Faso, while Islamic State Sahel Province has also deployed suicide drones in attacks, including on key infrastructure such as Niamey International Airport in early 2026.
Against this backdrop, Terra is positioning itself as part of a new wave of African defence manufacturers seeking to localise advanced security technology. “The only way Africa can have lasting peace is by uniting to build sovereign defence, not by relying on foreign security architecture,” said Nathan Nwachuku, co-founder and chief executive of Terra. He added that Ghana was chosen for its talent base and what he described as its growing ambition to become a defence export hub.
The Accra facility is expected to create about 120 engineering jobs and will produce three of the company’s core systems: the Archer VTOL for long-range surveillance and strike missions, the Iroko UAV for rapid tactical deployment, and Kama, a newly introduced interceptor drone designed for counter-drone operations at speeds of up to 300 km/h.
Founded in 2024 by Nwachuku and Maxwell Maduka, Terra has quickly grown into one of Africa’s most capitalised defence-tech startups, raising $34 million across two funding rounds in 2026. Investors include 8VC, Lux Capital, and Resilience17 Capital, led by Flutterwave CEO Olugbenga Agboola.
The company operates on a software-linked defence hardware model, bundling its drones with a proprietary system called ArtemisOS and offering them under recurring revenue contracts, a structure similar to US defence technology firms like Anduril and Palantir. Terra says its systems already support surveillance and protection for assets worth an estimated $11 billion across eight African countries, including energy and mining infrastructure.
Its expansion into Ghana follows earlier cooperation with Nigeria’s Defence Industries Corporation under a 2025 agreement aimed at boosting local defence manufacturing and training. The partnership was backed by Nigeria’s DICON Act 2023, which enables public-private collaboration in defence production.
The broader regional context is shaping demand. At least 11 African countries have now experienced drone-related attacks involving non-state actors, with insurgent groups increasingly adapting commercial drones for combat use. While several Sahel states have acquired advanced Turkish-made drones such as the Bayraktar TB2 and Akıncı, analysts say counter-drone systems remain underdeveloped, particularly against small, low-altitude threats.
Security experts warn that this capability gap has left critical infrastructure exposed, a vulnerability Terra is seeking to address with its interceptor-focused Kama system.
With construction on Pax-2 nearing completion, Terra says the facility remains on track for full operational rollout by mid-2026. The company’s next challenge will be converting its rapid funding growth into sustained government and regional defence contracts in an increasingly competitive security market.
