01 · Facility & Ecosystem
Fairlawn, Virginia Operating Base
A hard-tech facility ecosystem with advanced manufacturing, 3D printing, materials development, test and measurement, engineering analysis, and program execution capability.
HAPPENING NOW
All insights →
HELICON DEFENSE
The trusted transition infrastructure for allied defense innovation.
Helicon Defense helps selected Ukrainian and allied technologies move from battlefield validation toward U.S. and allied evaluation, demonstration, trusted production, acquisition, and sustainment.
We protect the originator, translate the operational need, and build the pathway to fielded capability.
Fast enough for wartime needs. Disciplined enough for allied transition.
The “So What” for the Warfighter
Innovation only matters if it reaches the people who need it, works in the environment where they operate, and remains supportable after the demonstration.
Helicon focuses on capabilities that improve decision advantage, reduce cost asymmetry, strengthen survivability, counter unmanned threats, operate through denied environments, and sustain operations under contested conditions.
- Decision advantage
- Cost asymmetry
- Survivability
- Counter-unmanned
- Denied environments
- Contested sustainment
- 2 hard-tech companies led to acquisition
- 125+ patents
- 200+ person production organization
- AS9100D manufacturing
- Direct-to-prime defense experience
Why Helicon had to exist
A successful prototype is not a fielded capability.
Between a battlefield-proven demonstrator and a warfighter holding a fielded system, there is a gauntlet of statutes, contract vehicles, budget lines, program offices, primes, testing regimes, and manufacturing steps. Most technologies die there.
Adversary industrial bases already have a fast, integrated way to absorb battlefield lessons. Democracies do not. No one owns the implementation layer between battlefield validation, protected IP, trusted manufacturing, acquisition, and sustainment. That missing layer is what Helicon is building.
It is not a consulting practice. It is not an introductions service. It is the operating discipline that turns hard-won allied innovation into capability the U.S. and its allies can field — and that lets serious capital deploy into that capability with confidence.
The race to learn
Ukraine is generating the most consequential defense learning in modern history. Adversaries are already absorbing it.
Ukraine is defending its sovereignty while simultaneously generating hard-won operational lessons about the future of warfare — on unmanned systems, electronic warfare, autonomy, resilient communications, and distributed defense production.
Russia is adapting continuously. China, Iran, and aligned actors are studying the battlefield, absorbing operational data, and translating those lessons into their own future capability.
The U.S. and its allies cannot allow battlefield-proven knowledge and innovation to move more efficiently into adversary ecosystems than into their own. Helicon Defense exists to help close that gap.
Where You Fit
Four operating audiences. One transition discipline.
Every visitor arrives with a different question. These four doors take you to the answer that fits your role.
For
Innovators
Bring battlefield-proven capability into U.S. and allied defense pathways — without losing control of the technology or the mission.
- Readiness and diligence
- U.S. market entry
- Compliance and structure
- Manufacturing and integration
- Capital and partnerships
U.S. Defense
Find, evaluate, adapt, and transition credible Ukrainian and allied technology with clearer technical, commercial, and operational context.
- Technology discovery
- Technical diligence
- Integration pathways
- Manufacturing readiness
- Sustainment and trusted relationships
Investors & Institutional Partners
Access a qualified pipeline of allied defense technologies supported by originator diligence, IP and structure review, U.S. market preparation, manufacturing-readiness analysis, customer-pathway development, and experienced operator judgment.
- Qualified technology and founder diligence
- U.S. structure and capital readiness
- Protected IP and commercialization pathways
- Manufacturing and scale-up assessment
- Defense-market and acquisition context
Field Guide
Understand the technologies, institutions, history, law, and operating environment shaping Ukraine and modern defense.
- Technology explainers
- Acquisition and transition
- History and international law
- Current operating context
- Source and reading libraries
Proof before process.
Material track-record claims link to supporting public sources.
MANUFACTURING TRANSITION INFRASTRUCTURE
Not just access. The ability to help build.
Helicon is backed by a founder/operator hard-tech ecosystem with real manufacturing infrastructure, advanced prototyping capability, test and measurement resources, and defense program execution experience. We are not simply matching innovators with customers. We help selected allied technologies move toward manufacturable, supportable, trusted production pathways.
02 · Geography & Talent
Defense-Industrial Geography
Located in Virginia’s defense and advanced-manufacturing corridor, with access to Virginia Tech, regional technical talent, Radford-area industrial infrastructure, and trusted U.S. production partners.
03 · Production Pathways
Rapid Production Pathways
Helicon can help structure low-rate production, supplier qualification, manufacturing-readiness planning, outsourced trusted production, and scalable line-development strategies for selected technologies.
04 · Operator Track Record
Founder/Operator Execution
Built on experience creating hard-tech companies, standing up quality systems, supporting prime contractors, commercializing advanced manufacturing platforms, and moving invention into production.
Originator-Protected
We sequence disclosures, protect attribution, and avoid shopping partner technology without consent.
- Sequenced disclosure. Non-confidential summaries first; sensitive detail only after the right agreements are in place.
- Protected attribution. The originator’s name, lineage, and contribution stay attached to their work across the pathway.
- No shopping without consent. Helicon does not circulate partner technology to potential customers, manufacturers, or integrators without explicit, written authorization from the originator.
What Helicon Produces
Concrete transition work, not vague access.
Helicon does not simply make introductions. A qualified engagement produces the practical artifacts a defense customer, prime, or allied buyer needs to evaluate, demonstrate, manufacture, and field a capability.
- Customer-ready capability briefs
- Evaluation and demonstration plans
- Manufacturing-readiness assessments
- Prototype-to-production implementation plans
- Low-rate production and pilot-line planning
- Compliance and export-control review pathways
- Trusted partner and supplier qualification
- Trusted U.S. and allied supplier maps
- Test, validation, and sustainment planning
- Manufacturing localization options
- Cost, scale, and build-vs-partner analysis
- U.S. / EU / NATO transition packages
- Sustainment and scaling plans
These are preparation and assessment deliverables. They are not promises of funding, contracts, endorsement, or automatic transition.
The transition layer
Five operating stages. One trusted infrastructure.
The transition layer is not a workflow. It is the operating discipline that lets a mature allied capability cross from battlefield validation into U.S. and allied production — with the originator's rights protected, the manufacturing base trusted, the acquisition pathway understood, and sustainment planned from day one. Every stage is a real capability Helicon operates.
Step 01
QUALIFY
Assess the technology, originator, battlefield or customer evidence, maturity, IP position, and mission relevance.
Step 02
PROTECT
Sequence disclosure, preserve background IP, protect founder value, and coordinate legal, export, licensing, and compliance boundaries before broad exposure.
Step 03
TRANSLATE
Convert battlefield validation into U.S. and allied defense language: operational gap, warfighter value, test path, procurement logic, sustainment, and cost-per-effect.
Step 04
DEMONSTRATE
Define relevant demos, evaluation paths, partner roles, customer access, and readiness for SBIR/STTR, OTA, BAA, CSO, eSOF, service labs, primes, or allied channels.
Step 05
PRODUCE & SUSTAIN
Develop the practical industrialization path: trusted supply chain, U.S./EU/allied manufacturing options, pilot-line or low-rate production planning, quality requirements, integration partners, sustainment model, and scale-up strategy.
Each stage exists somewhere in the defense ecosystem today. None of them connect at the speed democracies need. Helicon operates the connection.
WHY THIS IS DIFFERENT
Manufacturing-aware from day one.
Many transition efforts stop at introductions, slide decks, or customer access. Helicon is designed around the next question: can this capability actually be built, tested, supported, trusted, and scaled?
That manufacturing lens is applied early, before sensitive disclosures are overexposed and before originators are pushed toward the wrong partners.
- 01 Can it be made reliably?
- 02 Can it be sourced through trusted channels?
- 03 Can it be supported after delivery?
Capability Focus Areas
01
02
03
04
05
06
Six capability lanes where frontline relevance meets allied need.
Helicon concentrates on capability areas where operational pressure, allied innovation, and U.S. and allied transition needs come together.
Counter-UxS & Electronic Warfare
Detecting, locating, and responding to hostile unmanned systems, with emphasis on compact RF, electronic warfare, and cost-effective countermeasure pathways.
Explore →All-Domain Battlefield Awareness
Sensor fusion, RF detection, ISR, operator localization, and battlefield awareness across contested environments.
Explore →Human-Centered AI Decision Support
Human-centered AI that helps warfighters make better decisions faster, with provenance, confidence, and uncertainty — never autonomous lethal decision-making.
Explore →Contested Logistics & Sustainment
Distributed logistics, autonomous resupply, field repair, energy resilience, and sustainment under attack.
Explore →Resilient PNT / Anti-Jam / Electronic Maneuver
Positioning, navigation, timing, anti-jam capability, and electronic maneuver in GPS-degraded and spectrum-contested environments.
Explore →Trusted Manufacturing & Adaptive Production
Trusted sourcing, manufacturing-readiness, pilot-line planning, adaptive production, quality systems, sustainment, and scale-up pathways for selected allied technologies.
Explore →Cross-cutting: Energy and critical-infrastructure resilience cut across these lanes. Helicon tracks technologies that keep power, logistics, and infrastructure operating under attack, especially where they support contested sustainment and defense-industrial resilience.
Structured transition — not passive intermediation
What Helicon is, and what Helicon is not.
Helicon is
- A protected qualification and transition pathway
- A manufacturing-aware implementation partner
- A bridge between operational validation and trusted allied production
- A translator across innovators, warfighters, acquisition teams, manufacturers, and capital
Helicon is not
- A broker or introductions service
- A generic accelerator
- An arms marketplace
- A public intake channel for controlled technical information
The full boundary list — including compliance, export-control, and counsel disclaimers — is on How Helicon Works.
Operator evidence
We’ve done this before. Twice. Under real urgency.
Helicon Defense is founded and led by David Sherrer. Under his leadership — with the excellent teams he built — two hard-tech companies scaled from invention into manufactured, defense-integrated production, were acquired, and served prime contractors at scale. This is how we operate.
The pattern
1998 → 2002
Haleos / ACT MicroDevices
Optoelectronics scale-up during acute market urgency. Under David’s leadership, the team stood up electronic-hardware manufacturing lines to meet a demand signal that could not wait for a slower ramp. Acquired by Rohm and Haas, 2002.
2008 → 2019
Nuvotronics / PolyStrata®
RF and mmWave hardware transition from DARPA program work to acquired defense supplier. Under David’s leadership, the team scaled to 200+ staff, stood up ISO 9001 and AS9100D quality systems on SAP-supported lean manufacturing, and delivered directly to U.S. defense primes. Acquired by Cubic Corporation, 2019.
2025 → now
Helicon Defense
Allied defense innovation transition, at wartime urgency. Same leadership pattern — qualified capability, protected IP, trusted manufacturing, disciplined execution — applied to the missing infrastructure layer for allied defense.
Different technology. Different market. Same discipline — the discipline of leading a strong team through hard-tech scale-up when it actually matters.
2
Companies led to acquisition
Haleos / ACT MicroDevices (Rohm and Haas, 2002) and Nuvotronics / PolyStrata® (Cubic Corporation, 2019) — both under David’s leadership with the teams he built.
125+
Patents from David and team
Issued U.S. and foreign patents across RF, microwave, advanced packaging, optoelectronics, non-lethal defense, and manufacturing processes.
200+
Team scale reached
Nuvotronics team led to a 200+ headcount hard-tech production organization on SAP-supported lean manufacturing.
AS9100D
Production-grade quality
ISO 9001 and AS9100D quality systems stood up and operated under David’s leadership — the discipline defense primes require.
6
Prime integrator programs
Direct program execution history with BAE Systems, Raytheon (RTX), Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, and L3Harris.
DARPA
3D-MERFS Innovation Award
Awarded following Phase III execution under David’s leadership — the PolyStrata platform that anchored the Nuvotronics exit.
Active defense-program experience: DARPA, SBIR, STTR, U.S. Navy, U.S. Marine Corps, ONR, and related transition pathways — ongoing.
Live now
Helicon is not preparing to operate. Helicon is operating.
Athens Field Signal · July 8–10, 2026
Capital follows credible structure and credible people.
Conversations at the 30th Annual Government Roundtable are reinforcing the need for disciplined U.S. formation, investor readiness, founder diligence, and trusted industrial pathways for allied companies seeking international growth. Helicon is represented on the ground by Senior Advisor Natalya (Polyushkevych) Meyer.
Read the field note →Gdańsk · June 25–26, 2026
Ukraine Recovery Conference & Defence Day
Helicon was on the ground at URC 2026 — where reconstruction and security became inseparable and Defence Day became a dedicated track for the first time.
Read the Gdańsk readout →Fairlawn, Virginia
Trusted manufacturing base
Helicon's operating base is a hard-tech facility with advanced manufacturing, 3D printing, materials development, test and measurement, and defense program execution capability — the MRL side of the transition, on U.S. soil.
Manufacturing & transition →Ongoing
Ukrainian and allied innovator engagement
Live engagement with Ukrainian and allied defense innovators on protected pathways into U.S. and allied evaluation, manufacturing, and acquisition — under IP protection and originator equity discipline.
For innovators →
Contact Helicon
Reach us through the door that fits you.
Helicon routes every inquiry through the audience path that matches. Pick the one that fits, and you will reach the right person faster.
I am an innovator
Ukrainian or allied defense-technology creator seeking U.S. or allied transition.
Start the innovator conversation →I represent U.S. or allied defense
Program office, prime, integrator, or evaluator considering allied-origin capability.
Start the defense conversation →I am a manufacturing or integration partner
Producer, integrator, tester, or sustainment provider interested in the Helicon pathway.
Start the partner conversation →I am an investor or institutional partner
Capital source, family office, strategic investor, or institutional partner exploring the space.
Start the capital conversation →I am a domain expert
Technical, program, acquisition, legal, or manufacturing expert offering to lend expertise.
Join the expert network →I have another inquiry
Media, academic, press, general inquiry, or something else.
Contact Helicon →
Start the Conversation
Have a capability gap, a transition need, or a serious technology?
Helicon works with selected defense innovators, U.S. and allied capability teams, manufacturing partners, and legal and compliance collaborators. Initial conversations are limited to non-confidential summaries.