Cambium, a pioneer in advanced materials for defense, aerospace, and other high-performance sectors, announced a $100 million Series B financing led by 8VC, with participation from MVP Ventures, Lockheed Martin Ventures, GSBackers, Veteran Ventures Capital, J17 Ventures, Vanderbilt University, Alumni Ventures, Gaingels, Inevitable Ventures, JACS Capital, Jackson Moses, and other individuals and family offices.
This funding will accelerate both Cambium's product pipeline and materials manufacturing in the U.S. and Europe, supporting customers across aerospace, defense, energy, marine, motorsport, and other high-performance sectors.
Cambium is transforming how advanced materials are discovered and how they're scaled. Cambium fuses AI, chemical informatics, and high-performance computing to design entirely new monomers and polymers—hundreds of times faster than traditional methods. These materials are then manufactured, tested, and scaled in-house on proprietary and aerospace qualified assets to massively speed development feedback loops.
Cambium is pleased to announce that advanced materials industry veteran Chris Pederson is joining its board as an Independent Director. "Chris brings an extraordinary track record of commercializing advanced materials across many high-value industry verticals," said Cambium CEO Simon Waddington. "As Cambium rapidly expands its commercial footprint to deliver new technology innovation, most recently with the acquisition of the SHD Group, Chris's 35 years of experience in a variety of high-performance materials sectors, along with his M&A and corporate integration skills, give us yet another competitive advantage as we disrupt and re-imagine the possible in advanced materials."
SHD operates four sites: one at its U.K. headquarters, two in the U.S. (North Carolina and Oklahoma), and one in the EU (Slovenia). Together with Cambium's California base, the combined company will have a global innovation and manufacturing footprint capable of serving customers wherever they operate.
The combined company will be headquartered in El Segundo, California, with SHD operating as "SHD, a Cambium company," with its leadership, operations, and customer relationships remaining unchanged. Cambium Board Director Brett Schneider becomes President of SHD and Cambium Composites. SHD founders, Steve and Helen Doughty, continue as Director of Innovation and Director of Integration, respectively, to ensure continuity with the SHD team and their customers and suppliers through this next high growth phase.
The project will use generative AI to overcome the long-standing trade-off between thermal stability and mechanical strength in structural composites. Cambium and DARPA seek to identify commercially viable ultra-lightweight polymers capable of replacing structural titanium in high-performance applications.
The project will address limitations that plagued past machine learning efforts, including the scarcity of specialized polymer data, by exploiting novel multimodal AI architectures. The resulting technologies and novel materials will accelerate Cambium's existing AI-driven materials discovery and development platform to address defense needs and commercial markets in automotive, aerospace, and energy.
Cambium, revolutionizing the discovery and delivery of mission-critical advanced materials for defense and high-performance applications, announces the launch of its breakthrough ApexShield 1000 high-temperature resin system. The breakthrough allows parts fabricators to massively increase the speed of carbon-carbon parts production for hypersonics glide bodies and other critical components such as rocket nozzle extensions.
Cambium is taking its hypersonics-ready product portfolio to the next level through a contract with the US Navy. Our phthalonitrile material systems deliver not just performance but also unprecedented production speed and capacity to the U.S. Department of Defense and Program of Record prime contractors and subcontractors—two of the highest priorities in U.S. defense today.
“Brett is a tremendous addition to Cambium’s Board,” said Simon Waddington, Cambium’s Co-founder and CEO. “His leadership in advanced materials, billion-dollar global expansions, strategic transformations across aerospace, defense, and industrial
sectors makes him an invaluable asset.”
Cambium, a leader in advanced materials innovation, is in the final stages of commercializing its Laser Eyewear Protection (LEP) eyeglasses — the lead product in its broader Optics & Counter-Directed-Energy product portfolio — for use in defense and civilian applications. Cambium LEP eyeglasses are designed to provide superior protection and color clarity/contrast for pilots, sailors, ground forces, first responders, and others who can be subjected to, debilitated by, and permanently injured by laser dazzle.
Cambium was recently awarded second place in the Hypersonic Cost Reduction Challenge. The company’s high-temperature composite provides a cost-effective, domestically produced solution for hypersonic and aerospace applications, enhancing supply chain security and production efficiency. Cambium appreciates the recognition as it continues to innovate in aerospace materials.
EL SEGUNDO, California — Cambium, an advanced materials innovator that leverages bio-engineering, chemistry, materials science and proprietary computation for defense and other high-performance applications, is pleased to announce that James Griffin has joined the company as Chief Technology Officer and Tim Gardner joins as Chief Informatics Officer.
EL SEGUNDO, California — Cambium, an advanced materials innovator that leverages bio-engineering, chemistry, materials science and proprietary computation for defense and other high-performance applications, has been named one of the Top 100 venture-funded national security-focused and dualuse start-ups by the Silicon Valley Defense Group (SVDG) in its annual NATSEC100 report.
EL SEGUNDO + MOJAVE, California — Cambium, an advanced materials innovator for defense and other high-performance fields, announced a $19 million Series A funding round today
EL SEGUNDO + MOJAVE, California – Cambium, a defense and aerospace innovator, successfully completed its contract with the US Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division (NAWCWD) in China Lake, Calif.
Cambium, a defense and aerospace innovator, has been awarded a contract with BioMADE, a prime contractor and the bio-manufacturing arm of the Department of Defense (DoD) that drives the transition of bio-for-defense (B4D) products from the laboratory to the warfighter and commercial markets.
