Terra Industries Raises $22M to Expand Africa’s First Indigenous Autonomous Defense Systems

Terra Industries,  a defense technology company building autonomous security systems to protect Africa’s critical infrastructure, has raised an additional $22 million in funding, led by Lux Capital. The strategic funding extends its previously announced $11.8 million round, bringing total funding in the round to $34 million.

The extension included participation from existing investors, including 8VC, Nova Global, Silent Ventures, Belief Capital, Tofino Capital and Resilience17 Capital, founded by Flutterwave CEO Olugbenga Agboola, as well as angel investors such as Jordan Nel and Jared Leto.

The round came together quickly, in under two weeks, reflecting strong investor confidence in Terra Industries’ role in safeguarding critical infrastructure and helping address insecurity and terrorism across Africa.

Founded in 2024 by 22-year-old Nathan Nwachuku and 24-year-old Maxwell Maduka, Terra Industries designs and manufactures autonomous defense systems that help governments and infrastructure operators monitor, secure, and respond to threats across land, air, and maritime environments. Its technology is already deployed to protect power plants, mines, and other nationally critical assets across multiple African countries.

Security as the Missing Layer of African Industrialization

Africa is entering a decisive phase of industrialization. The continent holds roughly 30% of the world’s critical mineral reserves and invests close to $100 billion annually in infrastructure. However, much of this development is happening in remote and sometimes unstable regions where security has not kept pace.

Across Sub-Saharan Africa and the Sahel, infrastructure sabotage, illegal mining, organized crime, and terrorism continue to affect industries and livelihoods, creating a gap between investment and security that disrupts supply chains, weakens investor confidence, and strains government capacity.

That gap is widening as industrial activity accelerates across the continent.

“Africa is industrializing faster than any other region, with new mines, refineries, and power plants emerging every month. But none of that progress will matter if we don’t solve the continent’s greatest Achilles’ heel, which is insecurity and terrorism.”

– Nathan Nwachuku, co-founder and CEO, Terra Industries

To manage these risks, many infrastructure operators and governments still rely on imported security systems. However, these solutions can be expensive to maintain and are not always suited to local conditions, while dependence on external suppliers may introduce geopolitical risks, supply chain disruptions, and concerns over data control.

Pax Africana: Building Sovereign Intelligence and Security

These realities shape Terra Industries’s view of Pax Africana, a long-standing idea that Africa should take primary responsibility for peace and security across the continent. For Terra, this translates into a model built on indigenous security capability and sovereign intelligence.

In practical terms, this means future security efforts across the continent will rely less on troop-heavy, reactive approaches and more on predictive systems enabled by continuous infrastructure surveillance, scalable autonomous technology across varied terrains, and data sovereignty that allows African states to detect, deter, and respond to threats on their own terms.

To deliver on this, Terra Industries is building Africa’s first defense technology prime — a vertically integrated platform of autonomous security systems designed specifically for the continent’s terrain, scale, and operational realities. Its product portfolio includes long- and mid-range autonomous drones, sentry towers, unmanned ground vehicles, all connected through ArtemisOS, Terra’s proprietary software platform that enables real-time threat detection, autonomous mission planning, and coordinated response across vast and difficult environments.

The company already secures infrastructure assets valued at approximately $11 billion, with tens of millions in contracts and a robust public- and private-sector pipeline across the continent.

Terra Industries designs, builds, and manufactures its systems on the continent, with an engineering team composed primarily of African talent operating out of a 15,000-square-foot manufacturing facility in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city.

The additional $22 million will fund expanded manufacturing capacity, accelerate deployments across Nigeria and allied African countries, and grow Terra’s engineering, software, and business development leadership teams across Africa, London, and San Francisco.

“We believe in a future where local defense technology prevails, because security is the prerequisite for all economic growth. That’s why Terra Industries is building the African defense prime that secures sovereignty and provides the necessary counterterrorism technology on the continent.”

– Brandon Reeves, Partner, Lux Capital