Joby Aviation (NYSE:JOBY) just made its boldest move yet, and it has nothing to do with flying you to the airport. On August 11, the air taxi developer said it would acquire defense technology company Resonant Sciences for about $500 million, split between roughly $450 million in cash and $50 million in stock. The deal hands Joby a dedicated defense business built around radio-frequency and mission systems for national-security customers.
Investors did not celebrate. Shares fell 6.5% in premarket trading. Resonant Sciences is not a speculative bet bolted onto Joby's balance sheet.
The Dayton, Ohio company generates more than $100 million in trailing twelve-month revenue, has grown that figure by roughly 40% year-over-year, and already operates at positive adjusted EBITDA. It also comes with an established customer base that includes the US government, giving Joby cash flow today instead of a promise for tomorrow. The deal, expected to close in the first half of 2027, will fold Joby's hybrid and autonomous VTOL programs into Resonant and add about 1 million square feet of manufacturing and testing space in the Dayton region.
The logic goes beyond the balance sheet. Military spending has a long history of funding aviation technology that eventually finds its way into civilian aircraft, and defense budgets tied to the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East have only grown that appetite. Management framed the acquisition as pairing Joby's dual-use aircraft, propulsion and autonomy work with Resonant's radio frequency, sensing and low observability expertise, technology CEO JoeBen Bevirt said will help aircraft see, communicate and operate in complex environments.
That defense diversification is not free. Joby burned through $318 million in operating cash during the first half of 2026 while bringing in just $63 million in revenue over the same stretch. Layering a $450 million cash payment on top of that would trim Joby's roughly $2.3 billion liquidity cushion down to about $1.85 billion, an estimated eight to nine months off its cash runway if spending stays on its current pace.
The company still needs to win FAA type certification for its air taxi before its valuation can rest on the commercial side alone. The market's response made the tension obvious. Alongside the acquisition, Joby also announced a $750 million at-the-market equity offering, a move that arrives with shares already down 51% over the past year.
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