A drone company that just set up shop in Mesa is already looking for more space. Drone as a Service, a subsidiary of ZenaTech, opened an office at 955 E. Javelina Avenue in Mesa this month, and the company is now scouting sites in the East Valley for a new manufacturing facility that could initially employ 45 people.
The Mesa location opened officially as a sales and service center, stocked with a fleet of 15 ZenaDrone aircraft and staffed by certified drone pilots, according to inbusinessphx.com. The site sits at the same Javelina Avenue address — Suite 110-111 — that ZenaDrone lists as its Mesa office. Word of the planned manufacturing expansion, and the potential 45-job figure, comes from The Business Journals, which reported Drone as a Service is scouting sites for a new facility in the East Valley.
The company has also framed its Mesa push as a response to a labor shortage in Arizona's construction industry. The Arizona Chapter of the Associated General Contractors estimates the state needs more than 40,000 additional construction workers, a gap the inbusinessphx.com report ties directly to the rationale behind the Mesa launch. Beyond construction, the broader market for drone services is growing fast — Precedence Research pegs the U.S. drone-services market at over $4 billion in 2025, with projections climbing to nearly $35 billion by 2035, per the same account.
Manufacturing Plans Still Taking Shape
The new manufacturing site is described as being planned for the coming months, intended for expanded manufacturing and assembly beyond what the Javelina Avenue office currently handles. ZenaTech's own materials describe commissioning a significantly expanded Arizona footprint in Mesa for U.S.-based drone assembly, production and testing, according to a statement from ZenaTech. That same company release had previously indicated the Mesa expansion was expected to become operational in the first quarter of 2026.
This would not be ZenaDrone's first manufacturing move in the Phoenix area. Back in December 2024, ZenaTech announced that ZenaDrone had moved into a Phoenix manufacturing facility specifically to produce U.S. defense and NATO drones, the company said in a separate release. ZenaDrone is a wholly owned ZenaTech subsidiary that develops and manufactures autonomous business-drone solutions, per the company's own description.
Counter-Drone Testing Already Underway Nearby
ZenaDrone's defense ambitions extend into counter-drone technology. The company began initial flight testing of its Interceptor P-1 platform at a testing range near its Mesa facility, according to Metro Phoenix Alliance. The Interceptor P-1 is described as a low-cost, one-way autonomous counter-drone platform built to physically intercept hostile unmanned aircraft, the same report notes, and the company expects to keep expanding that testing program throughout 2026 toward operational demonstrations and customer evaluations.
That counter-drone push lands amid a broader surge in Pentagon interest in the category. The Army issued 10 indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contracts with a combined ceiling of $4.15 billion for counter-drone systems, Defense One reported, though only about $50 million had actually been obligated at the time of award. The Pentagon's overall counter-drone contracting effort carries a potential ceiling of $7 billion, and the Army's unmanned aerial systems marketplace has logged roughly $800 million in transactions since opening earlier this year, according to the outlet.
Part of a Wider Valley Buildout
Drone as a Service's expansion fits into a broader pattern of aerospace and defense growth across Greater Phoenix. The Greater Phoenix Economic Council describes the region as home to a growing base of companies working in autonomy, space systems and cybersecurity, with regional data covering 638 company-location records across 159 distinct industry classification codes. In 2026, defense-technology company Knightwerx relocated its headquarters and drone and sensor operations from Camarillo, California, to Scottsdale, according to the council.
Drone delivery is also taking root locally in other forms. Amazon Prime Air already operates drone delivery in the West Valley, serving homes within a 7-mile radius of its facility, per the Greater Phoenix Economic Council. Walmart and Wing, Alphabet's drone-delivery arm, are separately targeting a 2027 launch for autonomous aerial retail delivery across metro Phoenix, the council reports — signaling that the Valley's skies may get considerably busier in the years ahead, even as the specifics of Drone as a Service's planned East Valley plant remain unsettled.
