Three former SpaceX engineers have switched their attention from making rocket engines to manufacturing steel parts by using AI-driven software and robots. Their immediate goal involves establishing a prototype factory that can automate most of the steel fabrication process for crucial infrastructure components by 2027.
The startup, called 1872 , officially launched on July 22 with a ribbon-cutting ceremony at its Factory One facility in Cincinnati, Ohio. The company is initially focused on automating the manufacturing of steel skids—rectangular steel frames that can provide a moveable foundation for modular buildings—with the goal of supplying customers who are developing AI data centers or small modular nuclear reactors.
“We’re building towards autonomy, but we’re not necessarily building in a dogmatic fashion towards full autonomy,” Dan Summers, CEO of 1872, told Ars. “We may achieve 80 percent autonomous operations, and we may decide that it makes sense to stop there because there’s just diminishing returns to go to full 100 percent.”
The push for automation is not just about saving money. Industry associations have long warned of a growing shortage of skilled labor capable of supporting US efforts to build new AI data centers, semiconductor fabs, automotive factories, and shipyards.
The American Welding Society estimates that the United States will need 320,500 new welding professionals by 2029 because of retirements from an aging workforce, along with soaring demand for welding work. The Trump administration’s tightening restrictions on legal immigration and crackdown on undocumented immigration are further limiting options for welding-intensive industries such as shipbuilding.
“The problem that we are trying to solve is how do we build more things with a decreasing pool of skilled labor to do it with, and this is a good place to start in terms of implementing automation,” Summers said.
From rocket engines to steel skids
The 1872 cofounders, including Summers, Brian Mongilio, and Michael Grant, all bring relevant experience from having formerly worked for SpaceX . Summers oversaw the engineering team responsible for integrating and fabricating the Raptor engines that power the Super Heavy booster rocket for SpaceX’s Starship launch system .
The Raptor team’s use of “intelligent software” for tracking and managing the physical manufacturing of Raptor hardware became the “secret sauce” for implementing changes rapidly and precisely, according to Summers.
“We had software engineers that were working with our hardware engineers to not only develop the engine but to develop the system that would build the engine,” Summers told Ars. “Every engine was so different, and we were pushing so much change through the system that without that software, it would have been impossible to know what we needed to build, what we actually built, or how we were going to build it.”
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