Rocket propulsion company Aerojet Rocketdyne unveiled two big investments in Huntsville this week doubling down on its bet on the Alabama city where NASA and the Army are building next-generation rocket programs.

The company is a top provider of propulsion systems, engines and other hardware for the American defense and space industries, and its story in Huntsville is a window into the fast-moving local environment in both arenas.

Today, Aerojet Rocketdyne officially opened a big new rocket propulsion Advanced Manufacturing Facility in north Huntsville in a ceremony attended by Gov. Kay Ivey.

Thursday night, Aerojet Rocketdyne cut the ribbon on a new 122,000-square-foot Defense Headquarters building, also in Huntsville, aimed at winning more of the hundreds of millions of dollars that flow through NASA and Redstone Arsenal center to aerospace and defense contractors.

“Huntsville is a great place to build a future, and that’s what we’re doing with our expansion here,” Rocketdyne CEO Eileen Drake said in the city Friday.

The 136,000-square-foot advanced manufacturing facility will build products such as solid rocket motor cases and other hardware for the Standard Missile-3, Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system and other defense and space programs.

Some of those product lines will be transferred to Huntsville from other Aerojet Rocketdyne facilities, and local leaders at the Friday grand opening welcomed employees moving from from California and Virginia to Alabama.

Aerojet Rocketdyne employs more than 400 people in Huntsville now, up from 70 in 2017, and company leaders said it will hire more.

The company has a long string of successful aerospace and defense contracts and products, and it won a contract last year to provide new upper stage engines for the next-generation rocket the United Launch Alliance is building in Decatur.

The booster engines for that new rocket will be built by Blue Origin, which is building its own rocket engine plant in Huntsville now. Having both companies active in Huntsville shows the city’s key position in commercial, NASA and defense rocket propulsion, local leaders say.

“When a high-caliber company like Aerojet Rocketdyne locates a cutting-edge manufacturing facility in your state,” Gov. Kay Ivey said, “it’s a powerful testament to the skill of your workforce and to the advantages you can offer to business.”

Ivey was at the opening along with U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Huntsville) and other state and local leaders.