Radar · Auto in Iowa
Best Auto Companies in Iowa, United States
The 60 best Auto companies in Iowa, United States in 2026, ranked by funding and momentum. Funding, investors, founders, valuation, tech stack and live signals. Top: Great Plains Diesel Technologies.
By Rohit KhannaTrends & Stories
60companies tracked
$250Kdisclosed funding
0unicorns
2have raised
FLIAR INTELLIGENCE · AUTO × IOWA
Our analysis of 50 Auto companies
$9.4b in tracked funding; 94% of the stack-profiled cohort runs cloud-native; funding activity peaked in 2025.
50companies analysed
94%cloud-native stacks
2025funding peak (by rounds)
4unicorns
2015median founding year
65kcombined LinkedIn audience
78%of audience held by top 3
1companies hiring publicly (12 mo)
Ranked: Best Auto companies in Iowa
| # | Company | Employees | Disclosed funding | Stage | Founded | Tech stack | Web popularity | Patents & IP focus | Recent signals |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | featherlite inc Featherlite manufactures thousands of premium aluminum trailers annually at its operations in Iowa. | 1,249 | — | Acquired | 1973 | WordPressApple iCloud MailMicrosoft 365+29 | Top 5M | — | 2 job openings · 1 launch · 1 partnership |
| 2 | Great Plains Diesel Technologies Developer of fuel injection products | 1,223 | $250K | Deadpooled | 2008 | — | — | 15 patents Diesel fuel injection pressure sensing and control using magnetostrictive actuators | — |
| 3 | Arnold Motor Supply Online retailer of aftermarket auto-parts & accessories | 439 | — | Unfunded | 1927 | Cart FunctionalityApple iCloud MailGoogle Workspace+18 | Top 5M | — | — |
| 4 | dee zee Dee Zee is an automotive company offering truck accessories and truck personalization services. | 438 | — | Unfunded | 1977 | WixSentryBootstrap+20 | Top 5M | 50 patents Exterior automotive accessory systems: running boards, hinge covers, and truck bed assemblies. | — |
| 5 | harrison truck centers Harrison Truck Centers is a heavy truck dealership with locations in Iowa and Minnesota. | 400 | — | Acquired | 1975 | — | — | — | — |
| 6 | Link Heavy-duty suspension systems and specialty products for commercial vehicles | 354 | — | Unfunded | 1980 | Craft CMSPHPYii+9 | Top 5M | 93 patents Patents concentrated in electrical & electronics | — |
| 7 | McGrath Auto Midwest's premier auto dealer offering new and used vehicles, service | 317 | — | Unfunded | 1991 | WordPressAlgoliaMySQL+39 | Top 1M | — | — |
| 8 | j&p cycles motorsport aftermarket group J&P Cycles Motorsport Aftermarket Group is an automobiles & parts company. | 300 | — | Acquired | 1979 | Cart FunctionalityConstructor.ioPHP+37 | Top 50k | — | — |
Top 2 Auto companies in Iowa
#1
Deadpooled · Ames, Iowa · founded 2008 · 1223 employees$250Kraised▾
Deadpooled · Ames, Iowa · founded 2008 · 1223 employees
Developer of fuel injection products
Funding rounds
- May 2012Seed$250K
#2
Acquired · Polk City, Iowa · founded 1973 · 247 employees—raised▾
Acquired · Polk City, Iowa · founded 1973 · 247 employees
Provider of cash washing services
LinkedIn Pulse recent public activity · Jul 2026
Audience: 9k LinkedIn followers — 13.5% of this cohort's audience · 23 engagements/post (1.8× cohort median)
Funding rounds
- 2018Unattributed—
Investors
AEA Investors, Berkshire Partners, Trivest
Tech stack
AccessibeAmazon AlbAmazon Web ServicesAmplitudeApple Icloud MailCart Functionality
Funding & investor landscape
$250Ktotal disclosed funding
1companies funded
1disclosed rounds
0rounds last 90 days
Most active investors
Prism market signals · United States · country-scoped Prism corpus, 5,477,462 docs
Market landscape — 10 sub-themes by coverage
Share of Auto coverage by sub-theme.
Regulatory-risk over time rising
Funding & growth over time
funding rising · growth rising
RESEARCH FROM Iowa · institutions
What Iowa researches in autonomous vehicles
Iowa State University and University of Iowa predominantly research autonomous vehicle safety and adversarial ML robustness, with recent optimistic momentum (13 post-2020 papers, mean stance 0.37) tempered by modest safety concerns.
15 papersstance +0.3736% breakthrough29% concern
local research themes
Adversarial Robustness in Machine LearningAutonomous Vehicle Technology and SafetyInfrastructure Maintenance and MonitoringBiometric Identification and SecurityTraffic Prediction and Management TechniquesAdaptive Control of Nonlinear Systems
top institutions
- Iowa State University9
- University of Iowa6
Common questions
How many Auto companies are there in Iowa, United States?
Radar tracks 60 indexable Auto companies headquartered in Iowa, United States that meet our profile-completeness bar.
What is the total funding raised by Auto companies in Iowa, United States?
The Auto companies in Iowa, United States on this list have raised a combined $250K in disclosed equity funding across 1 funded companies.
Which is the highest-funded Auto company in Iowa, United States?
Great Plains Diesel Technologies is the highest-funded Auto company in Iowa, United States, with $250K in disclosed equity funding.
How many Auto companies in Iowa, United States are funded?
1 of the 60 Auto companies in Iowa, United States on this list have disclosed at least one equity funding round.
How many Auto unicorns are there in Iowa, United States?
None of the Auto companies in Iowa, United States on this list currently has a disclosed valuation of $1B or more.
Who are the top investors in Iowa, United States Auto companies?
The most active investors in Iowa, United States Auto companies on this list include AEA Investors, Berkshire Partners, Hall Venture Partners, Merit Capital Partners, Trivest.
Rohit KhannaTrends & Stories
Rohit lives in the feed. He covers what's moving right now — the funding rounds, launches and shifts breaking across the trade press — and ties them back to where the sector is heading.