When most of us think about the city of Detroit, we think of the peak of American manufacturing in this country, specifically around the automotive industry. Henry Ford, of course, pioneered streamlined manufacturing capabilities that allowed for mass production of automobiles, with the city eventually becoming home to the biggest automotive manufacturers in the world. As manufacturing began to be moved to other parts of the world, however, Detroit – and many other locations in that part of the United States – hit an economic downturn. The city has been on an upswing on multiple fronts in more recent years, however, and the next era of mobility – in which UAVs are expected to play a significant role – could spark the true comeback moment for a region that has the expertise and infrastructure to support greater domestic manufacturing in the space.

All of this was impossible to ignore last month at AUVSI’s XPONENTIAL event, which brought together autonomous systems professionals across commercial and defense applications right in the heart of Detroit. We covered some of the broader takeaways from that event last week, but beyond those industry-specific thoughts, Detroit’s presence as an apt host city was always front-of-mind, especially for this particular moment in the autonomous – and specifically drone – sector. 

As everyone in this industry is well aware, one of the American federal government's priorities right now is the onshoring of manufacturing for the UAV industry, with both national security and economics being used as the reasoning. While there is plenty of disagreement across the sector as to what the best strategies are to achieve these goals, there aren’t many within the U.S. who are against the general idea of bringing this manufacturing back to the nation. As that effort starts to increase and push comes to shove, it’s hard to think of a better place for that onshoring to happen than Detroit.

With that in mind, it was clearly no accident that the city was chosen as the host for this year’s XPONENTIAL event. The backdrop of Detroit at this current moment was repeatedly mentioned in keynote addresses throughout the event, including a talk by Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, speaking about the capabilities for building up on the defense industry in particular.

“Michigan’s defense industry has a storied past, a strong present, and a bright future. We’re home to world-class facilities, innovative companies, and talented workers,” she told attendees.

Of course, these same qualities that can help build up the domestic manufacturing base for defense capabilities can be used on the commercial side of the industry as well, which made for interesting conversations on both sides of the event. Michael Robbins, the president and CEO of AUVSI, is a Detroit native, giving even more of a spotlight to the city’s place in the industry right now. In his talk on the morning prior to the first full day of the event, he harkened back to the city’s place in the 20th century, both on the defense side in World War II and the automotive heyday of the city.

Having this event in such a manufacturing hub was not just a benefit for the organizations present at the show. The city was also eager to have this event downtown to bring some of these manufacturers to Detroit and show them everything the area has to offer. Claude Molinari, the president and CEO of Visit Detroit, told Commercial UAV News as much in a conversation on the show floor at XPONENTIAL. He excitedly detailed all that the city had to offer, with a bustling food and entertainment scene, as well as a growing area around the convention center in which the event was held. Molinari also shared that this specific event was a perfect fit, and that he and his team carefully look for events that will fit best with the city, with manufacturing being front and center in that conversation. 

Speaking with exhibitors and attendees at the event, the backdrop of Detroit was a consistent talking point. Many manufacturers, as one would expect, are in the planning stages for onshoring many of their processes, and Detroit’s infrastructure provides a convenient place to start that process. Eric Ringer from American Autonomy, for example, spoke about looking for partners on the hardware side with that U.S. manufacturing base, and Exedy Drones is one of those partners. The company is based in Michigan and has repurposed automotive facilities to build its domestically manufactured spray drones, a strategy that will likely be repeated by others in the industry rather than building new facilities from scratch.

Of course, physical space and equipment is only one piece of the puzzle for bringing manufacturing to Detroit, and the U.S. more broadly. Organizations also need a workforce that can handle today’s manufacturing processes, which require specific expertise. The good news is that Detroit, and the Midwest more generally, is among the best places in the U.S. for that expertise. Many of the Midwest schools are among the top research and engineering institutions in the entire country, with universities such as Northwestern, the University of Michigan, and Purdue to name just a few. 

Multiple people who spoke with CUAV News about the topic of Detroit’s place in manufacturing pointed to the locality of these institutions as another major reason why this is the area to watch as the drone industry looks to come back to the U.S.

None of this, to be clear, is to suggest that onshoring these manufacturing processes is going to be easy and as simple as dropping factories into the existing infrastructure in Detroit overnight. One of the biggest criticisms around the push for domestic manufacturing is how difficult it will be, both to retrofit or create new factories with the required capabilities, as well as educating the workforce for extremely complex manufacturing procedures. With that being said, it is a clear priority for the government, and whether it takes a week or a decade, there is a consistent push.

So if it’s going to happen, as was made abundantly clear during XPONENTIAL, there aren’t many better places where it could take place than Detroit and its surrounding communities in and around Michigan.