Expanding satellite factory in Gilbert to add hundreds of jobs

Northrop Grumman on Friday marked the completion of its expanded satellite factory in Gilbert to help meet growing demand for spacecraft.

The expansion adds 120,000 square feet to the prior 135,000-square-foot facility near McQueen and Elliot roads. Roughly 850 people now work at the factory and hundreds more will join them over an unspecified timetable.

“We have manufactured and delivered over 100 spacecraft for NASA science programs, commercial communications and national-security missions since we opened this facility in 2004,” said Cyrus Dhalla, vice president and general manager of the company’s tactical space systems division. “This new expansion will help us meet the increasing demand from these customers.”

Satellites for NASA, NOAA

Programs currently in production at the Gilbert facility include earth-observation satellites for NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Some of those satellites track agricultural use and forest expanses, while others measure glaciers and sea ice, said Mike Witt, a Northrop Grumman vice president of sustainability, noting that the Gilbert-factory expansion announcement was made on Earth Day. He and others didn’t discuss water use at the site.

The factory also will be home to integration and testing of the Habitation and Logistics Outpost. HALO is the first module of NASA’s Lunar Gateway that will serve as a space station orbiting the moon, providing support for long-term human exploration of the moon and deep space.

The Gilbert campus conducts satellite design, engineering, manufacturing, testing and program management, with spacecraft manufacturing done under one roof.

Major government contractor

Virginia-based Northrop Grumman, with roughly 90,000 overall employees, has operations in space, aeronautics, defense and cyberspace. The corporation earned a profit of $7 billion in 2021 on $35.7 billion in revenue, 85% of which was generated by the federal government.