FLYING FASTER

Founded in 2015 by former SpaceX and Blue Origin propulsion engineer Joe Laurienti, Ursa Major was born from a simple but urgent conviction: America needed better, faster propulsion, and it wasn’t going to come from the legacy industrial base.

What started as a small team in Colorado quickly became a national force in advanced propulsion. Ursa Major became the first American company to fire an oxygen-rich staged combustion engine – a milestone previously only achieved by Russian engine-makers.

Ursa Major’s first engine, Hadley, achieved flight qualification and powered multiple hypersonic missions. From there, the company scaled its portfolio to include solid rocket motors, satellite propulsion, and a second liquid hypersonic engine: Draper, a storable, throttleable system designed for rapid deployment in real-world conditions.

Over the past decade, Ursa Major has delivered more than 100 engines, conducted over 100,000 seconds of hotfire testing, and built a flexible production infrastructure centered on additive manufacturing and modular design. With each success, Ursa Major has proven that it’s not just building engines; we’re rebuilding what it means to deliver aerospace and defense hardware in the 21st century.

Today, Ursa Major continues to grow its footprint and mission set, accelerating critical capabilities for the U.S. and its allies across domains.