Palantir Technologies Inc.’s PLTR Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar praised Tesla Inc. TSLA and SpaceX’s manufacturing approaches as models for revitalizing American industrial capabilities during an appearance on The Ben Shapiro Show on Wednesday.
What Happened: “It’s not true that we’re bad at making things in this country. The ability to do that in a modern way is asymmetrically distributed,” Sankar said. “SpaceX makes so much of what they do vertically integrated internally. Tesla is a software-defined production line.”
His comments come as Palantir’s stock has surged over 312% in the past year, with the company’s market capitalization now exceeding traditional defense contractor Lockheed Martin Corp. LMT. The data analytics firm has been expanding beyond its government roots, with commercial revenue now representing 50% of its business.
Sankar criticized current manufacturing approaches, particularly in supply chain management. “When I interact with these companies, their understanding of their supply chain is very shallow. They treat it as a black box,” he said, contrasting this with Elon Musk‘s comprehensive approach at his companies.
Why It Matters: The CTO’s remarks align with recent developments in Palantir’s strategic direction. CEO Alex Karp has emphasized the company’s evolution into an AI powerhouse, particularly in military applications. The company recently partnered with Amazon Web Services to provide Anthropic’s Claude AI models to U.S. intelligence agencies.
Addressing defense capabilities, Sankar highlighted concerning gaps in U.S. military readiness. “If you look at the amount of weapons we have on hand to fight China, war games put it at 8 days. It should be closer to 800 days,” he warned, citing the Ukraine conflict as evidence of production shortfalls.
Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives projects 2025 as a breakthrough year for Palantir’s AI platform, as the company continues to integrate advanced manufacturing and artificial intelligence capabilities across both government and commercial sectors.
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Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
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