Motorola leads $125M round for Brinc, fueling 911 drone boom amid US import crackdown
Brinc Drones, a Seattle-based maker of 911 response drones, has raised $125 million in a new funding round led by Motorola Solutions, expanding its ambitions to put a drone on the roof of every police and fire station in America.
The company says it will use the money to expand production capacity, bring new products to market, and grow its workforce. Later this year, Brinc will move to a new headquarters and factory in Seattle’s Queen Anne area — a former fish yard on the Lake Washington Ship Canal — with three times the production space of its current factory.
The investment and expansion comes as new federal restrictions squeeze Chinese-made drones from the U.S. market, giving domestic manufacturers a new opportunity.
Brinc planes and machines are used by police, firefighters, and other emergency responders to reach 911 calls before police arrive, deliver medical supplies, and assist in hostage interviews. Founded in 2019 by CEO Blake Resnick, now 26, Brinc moved from Las Vegas to Seattle in 2021.
Existing investors Index Ventures and Figma founder Dylan Field also participated in the latest round, the company said. Motorola Solutions became an investor in Brinc in April 2025 as part of a $75 million round that created a strategic alliance between the two companies.
Brinc did not disclose a specific amount related to the round but said it nearly doubled from last year’s $480 million, meaning it has yet to reach the unicorn billion mark. The new capital brings Brinc’s total capital to more than $280 million.
Other investors who backed the company include OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang, Palantir CTO Shyam Sankar, former LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, former acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan and former FCC chairman Julius Genachowski.
The company has grown to 187 employees, up from 108 last year, and is in the process of hiring 41 more. A maximum of 250 employees are expected when the new plant opens.
All of its drones are made in the US, which is a growing selling point as federal regulators tighten restrictions on Chinese-made drones. The FCC in December 2025 blocked foreign-made drones from obtaining US equipment approval, effectively barring new models – mainly from the Chinese giant DJI – on the American market.
Some exemptions have been granted for certain non-Chinese drones, and DJI is contesting this decision in court, but Brinc says the change has caused many public safety agencies to view American-made drones as such.
Brinc drones also include Motorola public safety radios, 911 call systems, and dispatch software. An officer can launch a Brinc Drone by pressing a button on a Motorola radio, or send one automatically when a 911 call comes in.
The company’s drone portfolio includes the Lemur 2 for indoor use, the Responder 911 response drone, and the Guardian, a large Starlink-connected drone unveiled in March that the company says is designed to shut down police helicopters.
The company said it will more than triple revenue in 2025 and has signed nearly four times as many 911 drone contracts so far this year as it did in the same period in 2025. New customers include the Los Angeles Fire Department and the St. Louis Police Department.
More than 900 public safety agencies now use Brinc products, according to the company, including more than 20% of US SWAT teams. That’s a fraction of the roughly 80,000 police and fire stations across the country that Brinc targets.
