Former SpaceX engineer Jordan Black, now CEO of Senra, is pushing a long-overlooked part of vehicle manufacturing into a more digital era. The startup, founded in 2023 with co-founder Benjamin Shanahan, has secured a $65 million Series B round to expand its platform for wire harness production.
Wire harnesses are the internal electrical systems that connect everything from rockets and satellites to cars, planes, and industrial vehicles. Despite their growing importance in advanced machines, much of the work still relies on highly manual methods. Black says the sector has changed little since the Cold War era, with technicians often building harnesses by hand on wooden tables.
Senra is not trying to eliminate skilled labor. Instead, it aims to support technicians with software, standardized workflows, and automation tools that improve consistency and speed. Its proprietary platform, Amp, organizes engineering inputs, tracks materials, and creates a digital twin to guide production.
The company says it also operates what Black describes as the only federally certified wire harness training program, helping prepare workers for more modern manufacturing environments. Senra currently produces about 1,000 harnesses a month across two factories and plans to scale that figure to 10,000 monthly by 2027.
With customers spanning defense systems, maritime vehicles, launch vehicles, and satellites, Senra is positioning wire harnessing as a strategic layer in the future of advanced manufacturing. The company's growth reflects a broader shift toward smarter, more scalable industrial production.
As manufacturing becomes more software-driven, innovations like this could help set new standards for precision, efficiency, and large-scale hardware production in the years ahead.
