X-Bow Launch Systems lands $11 million missile motor contract
X-Bow secures a competitive Missile Defense Agency deal to build a high-performance solid rocket motor and widen a supply base now dominated by two manufacturers.
ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO — X-Bow Launch Systems has won a competitive $11 million Missile Defense Agency contract to build a high-performance solid rocket motor.
The Albuquerque, New Mexico, company will design, develop and demonstrate the motor under a follow-on Small Business Innovative Research Second Phase II contract for the agency’s Rapid Response Small Launcher Technology program (see war.gov). The contract aims to expand the solid rocket motor industrial base, which now relies on a duopoly of two primary manufacturers. Work will run in Albuquerque from July 2026 through July 2028. The agency procured the award competitively via the Governmentwide Point of Entry website under SBIR topic number SB173-006, obligating $11 million in fiscal 2026 research, development, test and evaluation funds. The Missile Defense Agency at Redstone Arsenal, Alabama, serves as the contracting activity.
Founded in 2016, X-Bow produces solid rocket motors and hypersonic technologies for defense and space customers, using additive manufacturing to create customizable, low-cost motors (see wikipedia.org). The company positions itself as a non-traditional supplier aiming to ease supply chain vulnerabilities in propulsion for U.S. missile systems and hypersonic weapons (see grokipedia.com). X-Bow closed a $105 million Series B funding round led by Lockheed Martin in May 2025, supporting an energetics campus near Austin, Texas (see grokipedia.com).
The award is X-Bow’s first contract of 2026 and the sixth Department of Defense contract awarded in New Mexico this year. It stands as the smallest Missile Defense Agency contract issued so far in 2026 and was among 10 Department of Defense contracts announced nationwide on July 9, 2026.
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