SpaceX veteran and partner bring aerospace manufacturing firm to Industry City

Article originally written for Crain’s by By Julian Nazar

An aerospace hardware manufacturer has officially landed in New York City.

Beyond Reach Labs has leased 16,000 square feet of space at 4014 First Ave. in Industry City’s Building 26. It will use the space, which was previously occupied by fabrication company David Stark Design, for its research and manufacturing facility.

The Brooklyn-based aerospace company, which SpaceX veteran Pele Collins and his partner Mitchell Fogelson launched in 2023, picked Industry City because of the Sunset Park campus’ 50 megawatts of available power, oversized freight elevators and heavy floor loads, according to an announcement from Industry City.

Beyond Reach Labs focuses on building solar panel collections known as “deployable solar arrays” that capture sunlight and convert it into usable electricity, according to its website. The company specifically provides this technology for high-powered satellites, commercial space stations and orbital data centers.

Its Flarewing technology, which is a patent-pending solar array structure, folds into the size of a dining table for launch and then expands to the length of a football field in orbit. It can produce up to 10 times as much power per launch as traditional solar panels, according to the announcement.

“When we thought about where to permanently land, New York kept winning the argument because the engineers we want to hire want to be here, and they don’t want to leave,” Fogelson said in a statement. “Industry City has the power, the infrastructure and the community we need to scale our business.”

Beyond Reach Labs’ lease is for two years. A media representative for Industry City declined to share the asking rent.

Industry City was represented in-house by Jeff Fein, Nick Shears, and Brad Blum.

“Beyond Reach Labs is exactly the kind of company Industry City was built for,” Fein said in a statement. “They needed industrial power, freight infrastructure and room to build innovative hardware in New York City, and they found all of it here.”

JLL’s Jeremy Liebler and James Ferrigno represented Beyond Reach Labs. Neither broker responded to a request for comment before press time.