Just one month after securing an $11.75 million round led by Joe Lonsdale’s 8VC, the Lagos-born defense-tech startup Terra Industries has closed an additional $22 million extension led by Lux Capital. The round also drew participation from 8VC, Nova Global, and Resiliience17 Capital, a fund set up by Flutterwave CEO Olugbenga Agboola.

The fresh capital brings the total funding for the two-year-old company to $34 million, a figure that underscores a rare but aggressive entry of American defense-tech venture capital into the African market. Founded in 2024 by Nathan Nwachuku (22) and Maxwell Maduka (24), Terra Industries is positioning itself as the continent’s first “defense prime,” mirroring the vertically integrated models of Western unicorns like Anduril and Shield AI.

The sovereignty play

For decades, African defense procurement has been a tug-of-war between foreign state-backed entities. Hardware and intelligence systems from China, Russia, and Europe dominate the landscape, ranging from border surveillance drones to maritime monitoring.

Terra Industries is pitching a reversal of this dependency. The company argues that reliance on foreign vendors has left African governments with fragmented, “black box” systems that cannot be serviced locally, creating significant vulnerabilities regarding data sovereignty.

“Before Terra, governments and operators across Africa were often forced to rely on foreign defense systems from China, Europe, and elsewhere,” says Maxwell Maduka, co-founder and CTO.

By offering tighter hardware-software integration, Terra ensures that sensitive security data remains within the jurisdiction of the client nation — a pitch that helped the company secure its first federal contract in Nigeria earlier this year.

Scaling a ‘Defense Prime’

Terra’s strategy is built on vertical integration. Rather than acting as a niche drone vendor, it aims to own the entire “kill chain” of infrastructure protection.

The centerpiece of their technology is ArtemisOS, a unified software platform designed to orchestrate large-scale security operations. It integrates data from a diverse fleet of hardware, including:

• Archer VTOL & Iroko UAV: Long- and mid-range drones for aerial surveillance.
• Druma: Autonomous ground-based robotic systems.
• Sentry Towers: Autonomous surveillance towers for perimeter geofencing.

The company claims its systems are already protecting assets valued at approximately $11 billion across the energy and mineral resource sectors. CEO Nathan Nwachuku noted that Terra has already generated more than $2.5 million in commercial revenue, primarily from securing high-value industrial sites like power plants and mines.

Geopolitical expansion: From Abuja to Riyadh

The extension round was reportedly driven by “faster-than-expected traction” in international partnerships. Most notably, Terra recently signed a joint venture with AIC Steel, one of the Middle East’s largest infrastructure contractors.

The deal involves establishing a manufacturing facility in Saudi Arabia to produce surveillance infrastructure and security systems. While Africa remains the primary focus, the Saudi expansion signals Terra’s intent to target “allied” emerging markets facing similar threats to critical infrastructure.

The investor view: A competitive landscape

The involvement of Lux Capital and 8VC (the latter having backed Western defense heavyweights) suggests a growing appetite for “allied” defense technology to counter non-Western influence in the Global South.

However, compared to its Western counterparts, Terra is operating on a fraction of the capital:

Challenges ahead

Displacing entrenched relationships between African governments and state-owned suppliers like China’s DJI or Russian state firms remains a steep climb. Defense procurement is as much about diplomacy as it is about technology, and Terra will need to prove its hardware can survive the high-stakes, harsh environments of the Sahel and sub-Saharan regions over the long term.

For now, with $34 million in the bank and a manufacturing foothold in the Gulf, Terra has the resources to attempt a significant restructuring of how African nations secure their borders and resources.