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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news, and.

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Speaker 2: We kick things off with Brian Shimp, CEO of ANDERIL,

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Speaker 2: as the first of many conversations. Brian, we're grateful to

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Speaker 2: be here at ANDERILL. There has been a lot of

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Speaker 2: hype around the company, a deep focus on what it

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Speaker 2: is doing, how it is growing, and so as a

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Speaker 2: place to start, which you just bring us up to

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Speaker 2: speed on where ANDERI is today operationally, revenue, the business

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Speaker 2: it is doing with the US government and Western allies.

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Speaker 3: Absolutely well, thank you for having me on. Really excited

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Speaker 3: to have you here. The Andral has been around about

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Speaker 3: eight years, but we've grown incredibly in that time. I

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Speaker 3: think this year we're going to be over sixty five

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Speaker 3: hundred employees. We've got something like about half of them

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Speaker 3: here in Costa Mesa. We're looking to basically double revenue

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Speaker 3: this year. So we're about a billion last year, we'll

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Speaker 3: go over two billion this year. And we're ramping production

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Speaker 3: about four hundred percent. So a lot of the mix

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Speaker 3: is switching from one of the earlier stage things we

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Speaker 3: were doing, which were you know, kind of experimental, really

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Speaker 3: learning what the technology could do, how to integrate it

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Speaker 3: with war fighters. This year we're really moving into this

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Speaker 3: mode of really producing.

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Speaker 2: Brian, forgive me. We've actually got some breaking news that's

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Speaker 2: just crossed the Bloomberg terminal. President Trump is saying that

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Speaker 2: he was due to meet China's President g in two

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Speaker 2: weeks time. He's saying now that he sees no reason

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Speaker 2: to do so. The team are going to put some

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Speaker 2: of the headlines up on the screen. But Caro, a

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Speaker 2: significant piece of news because part of what we wanted

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Speaker 2: to discuss today was China, the President saying that he's

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Speaker 2: calculating increased tariffs on Chinese products.

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Speaker 1: This is a dining up of GPN attentions.

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Speaker 2: Brian, bear with us. We are now seeing this quite

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Speaker 2: sharp market reaction. Clearly the S and P five hundred

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Speaker 2: is changed direction here because I think, well, you know,

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Speaker 2: jumping Carra. I think part of the point is that

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Speaker 2: we were headed in a different direction, and.

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Speaker 1: This brings so many questions around what the TikTok relationship

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Speaker 1: had been, and much of that had been sort of

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Speaker 1: almost this lynchpin in relationships between President She and indeed

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Speaker 1: President Trump, but then been this ongoing narrative about how

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Speaker 1: we could rectify and rehabilitate the relationship there've been calls

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Speaker 1: from China perhaps wanting yet further relief from some of

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Speaker 1: the higher tarists.

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Speaker 2: That they've been Sorry, I've just pulled up the true

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Speaker 2: social posts, and that's where the President's communicated and he's

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Speaker 2: basically saying that China is becoming very hostile. Let's get

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Speaker 2: back to the conversation.

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Speaker 1: Well, your take, Brian, because in many ways, andrel and

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Speaker 1: defense tech as a whole is about the story of

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Speaker 1: national security, and it is about US versus China. Is

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Speaker 1: that where you see the key risks.

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Speaker 3: That is one of the key conflicts. But if you

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Speaker 3: look worldwide, I mean you've got land wars in Europe,

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Speaker 3: You've got you know, the Red Seas still basically denied.

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Speaker 3: Iran doesn't look like it's going to slow down anytime soon. China,

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Speaker 3: beyond just the tensions with US, has been constantly aggravating

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Speaker 3: with the Philippines, you know, constantly fighting over different islands

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Speaker 3: and things like that. So you're in this period of

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Speaker 3: just massive geopolitical instability, and China is obviously the focus.

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Speaker 3: But I mean they've had a very strategic view to this, right,

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Speaker 3: Like they've blocked so they've pump put a significant export

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Speaker 3: controls on magnets for high end but rare US.

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Speaker 1: For example, we understand the breaking newser today as well

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Speaker 1: as China's making harder and harder for rare earth to

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Speaker 1: be exploited not just the US.

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Speaker 2: But to Europe.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think this is part of a long

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Speaker 3: term strategic plan they have had, right, they have used

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Speaker 3: industrial policy beyond just military power to construct a world

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Speaker 3: where they have a lot of leverage over the US

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Speaker 3: and their allies. They drive dependence on these things and

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Speaker 3: it's a very sophisticated strategy that they're playing. Yes, I

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Speaker 3: think this is something that Trump recognizes. I think he

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Speaker 3: is a very good negotiator. If he's saying these things,

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Speaker 3: he understands what that means and how he is using

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Speaker 3: that to position for maximum advantage. And so I think

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Speaker 3: it's going to be a long run conflict with China,

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Speaker 3: and that's something we've just got to be prepared for.

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Speaker 2: Brian, Thank you for rolling with this. The news is

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Speaker 2: breaking as we go to air, the markets reacting. One

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Speaker 2: of the things that we've just shown on the street

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Speaker 2: is the semiconductor index. Yeah. One reason why it's critically

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Speaker 2: important to talk to you and Reill is your efforts

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Speaker 2: to re ensure the manufacturing base in this country in Ohio.

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Speaker 2: But in research for being here today, Caroline and I

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Speaker 2: looked a lot at the supply chain for your industry.

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Speaker 2: Why everything from why Harness through to GPUs that go

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Speaker 2: on board a lot of the weapons behind us. Could

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Speaker 2: you just expand on that a little bit, you know

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Speaker 2: why arsenal one is so critical in that sense in

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Speaker 2: that context absolutely so.

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Speaker 3: You know, when you look at defenses one of those

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Speaker 3: areas where national security is paramount, pulling these technologies onto

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Speaker 3: US and ally and manufacturing is absolutely key. And the

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Speaker 3: strategy we've taken with this is there is a lot

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Speaker 3: of industrial capacity in the US. There is the ability

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Speaker 3: to take advantage of largely commercial industry that can manufacture

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Speaker 3: these things. But when you start stepping back, there's things

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Speaker 3: that defense alone can solve. Right These are things like

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Speaker 3: you know, the rare earth magnets, germanium supply, these are

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Speaker 3: things that China has strategically tried to stranglehold. And this

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Speaker 3: will require beyond just stating as a policy that you

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Speaker 3: have to sources of America. The sources are very very limited.

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Speaker 3: This is areas where I've been really encouraged by what

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Speaker 3: the Trump administration has done around trying to reignite this

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Speaker 3: idea of how do you do smart industrial policy? What

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Speaker 3: is it going to look like in the US. It's

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Speaker 3: going to look different. It's going to be a combination

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Speaker 3: of tariffs, it's going to be a combination of things

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Speaker 3: they did with like MP materials guaranteed off take. There's

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Speaker 3: just this very different strategy that needs to be taken

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Speaker 3: to really solve this on a country level scale. And

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Speaker 3: for US, we can be early adopters, right like, we

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Speaker 3: can take advantage of all those things, and we're building

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Speaker 3: out a mass of manufacturing complex in Ohio to be

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Speaker 3: able to take advantage of all of those suppliers in

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Speaker 3: the US and build a lot of things here on shore.

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Speaker 2: Okay, so the breaking news is that the president has

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Speaker 2: taken true social and he is saying that it looks

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Speaker 2: like he now won't meet with China's she and things

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Speaker 2: are changing. We will discuss that for the next hour

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Speaker 2: while we have you. Anderil has been in the headlines

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Speaker 2: partly because of the insate website of all kinds of

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Speaker 2: investors to be involved. You did a secondary or a

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Speaker 2: tender for your employees would you talk about the focus

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Speaker 2: you have right now in talent and that mechanism to

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Speaker 2: keep people basically.

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Speaker 3: No, absolutely, So the defense world has shifted a lot, right, Like,

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Speaker 3: a lot of the people in traditional defense industry are

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Speaker 3: amazing at things like aircraft design and hypersonics and things

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Speaker 3: along those lines. But the next generation of this really

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Speaker 3: looks different. It really looks about software. It looks how

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Speaker 3: you adopt commercial manufacturing approaches. It's how you mass manufacture

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Speaker 3: these capabilities. It's a very different focus. We're moving out

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Speaker 3: of an era where we need to make relatively few,

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Speaker 3: a very very expensive, high end things. We're moving into

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Speaker 3: an era where it's much more about how do we

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Speaker 3: have things at scale that are smarter, that are more autonomous.

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Speaker 3: And so this ability to attract the best talent into

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Speaker 3: this really is coming from tech companies. It's coming from universities.

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Speaker 3: It's people who otherwise would have at you know, kind

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Speaker 3: of all the tech company brand names. You would know,

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Speaker 3: part of that's compensation and liquidity and all the startup economics,

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Speaker 3: but honestly a lot more of it is just do

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Speaker 3: they get to work on exciting problems with people they like,

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Speaker 3: on things that really matter? Right, and I think we

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Speaker 3: present this opportunity to be very clear in our purpose

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Speaker 3: and our mission, something that's going to be impactful, and

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Speaker 3: they get to work on just amazing cutting edge things,

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Speaker 3: right like making autonomous fighter jets and you know, these

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Speaker 3: reusable miss There's just an absolutely crazy thing to work

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Speaker 3: on if you're a young engineer. And that's what we've

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Speaker 3: really found is the formula to get the best and brightest.

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Speaker 3: Here is an exciting opportunity to actually contribute, give back

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Speaker 3: and build something incredible.

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Speaker 1: Ron What a joy to have you sat with us

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Speaker 1: rolling within Broiking News and be surrounded by all of

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Speaker 1: this gear that you are driving innovation on branch and

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Speaker 1: appreciate your CEO of Andreill