Melbourne Industries Guide

Brevard County, which includes Melbourne, holds about ten times the national share of electronics manufacturing jobs and about nine and a half times the share of aerospace jobs, while health care and social assistance employs about as many people as all manufacturing.

The figures are Brevard County totals from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, because the federal series is published by county rather than by city (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics). A location quotient above 1 means Brevard has a larger share of its jobs in that industry than the nation; the 14.05 for semiconductors and electronic components is the highest in the table. Across all private Brevard employers the 2024 average was 213,004 jobs and $68,058 in annual pay, so the electronics and aerospace rows pay close to double the county average. Aerospace products and parts paid the most, an average of $133,446 a year (BLS QCEW).

The seven Melbourne industry guides follow the table: the aerospace industry guide, the aviation manufacturing guide, the defense industry guide, the semiconductors and electronics guide, the space technology guide, the healthcare industry guide and the biotech and medical devices guide.

L3Harris Technologies, which calls itself the largest aerospace and defense company in Florida, gives its business address as 1025 W NASA Blvd in Melbourne in its federal securities filings.

The SEC record lists L3Harris under industry code 3812, search, detection, navigation, guidance and aeronautical systems, and shows that the company filed as Harris Corp until June 25, 2019 (U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission). L3Harris said in December 2024 that it has been headquartered in Florida since 1978 and employs 9,000 people at 27 Florida locations (L3Harris, December 6, 2024). The space technology guide and the defense industry guide cover the L3Harris story and the older Harris Corporation roots in Melbourne.

Northrop Grumman's Melbourne campus covers 17 buildings on 109 acres next to the airport, and the company says the site designs, develops and tests manned aircraft and battle management systems, including work on the U.S. Navy E-2D Advanced Hawkeye (Northrop Grumman). Embraer, the Brazilian planemaker, opened an 80,000-square-foot Phenom 100 and Phenom 300 assembly building and a 58,000-square-foot customer delivery center in Melbourne in 2011, then a $24.2 million Engineering and Technology Center USA on September 8, 2014 (EDC of Florida’s Space Coast). The aviation manufacturing guide and the aerospace industry guide go deeper on these airport campuses.

Melbourne Orlando International Airport is a major industry address in Melbourne, with more than 60 tenants in aerospace, defense and manufacturing on airport property.

The airport cites a 2023 Florida Department of Transportation study that credits the airport and its tenants with more than $3.1 billion a year for the Space Coast economy (Melbourne Orlando International Airport). Passenger traffic matters too: the airport served 747,691 passengers in 2023, a total beaten only by its record year of 1990, and it has opened a $72 million renovation and expansion adding more than 86,000 square feet (Melbourne Orlando International Airport).

Northrop Grumman's campus sits adjacent to the airport, and the Embraer assembly, delivery and engineering buildings are at the airport as well (Northrop Grumman; EDC of Florida’s Space Coast). The aerospace industry guide covers the airport employers in detail.

Recent large aerospace investments near Melbourne are L3Harris projects in Palm Bay: two satellite and microelectronics buildings announced in 2024 and a satellite facility expansion completed in 2025.

On December 6, 2024, L3Harris announced a $2 million state High Impact Business Performance grant for two new Palm Bay facilities: a satellite integration building of about 93,000 square feet expected to add about 100 jobs at an average salary near $105,000, and an advanced microelectronics building of about 98,000 square feet expected to add about 100 jobs at about $111,000 (L3Harris). On August 21, 2025, the company completed a $100 million expansion of its 94,000-square-foot satellite integration and test facility in Palm Bay for missile warning and tracking satellites (L3Harris).

The federal job counts show the same direction. Brevard County private manufacturing grew from 33,224 jobs in 2023 to 34,805 in 2024, and navigation, measuring and control instrument jobs rose from 5,879 to 7,046 over the same year (BLS QCEW 2023; BLS QCEW 2024).

The practical point for Melbourne is that this growth is in Palm Bay, while the company address stays on NASA Boulevard in Melbourne (SEC). The semiconductors and electronics guide covers the microelectronics side, and the space technology guide covers the satellite work. Announced job counts are company expectations, not counts of filled positions.

Health care and social assistance is one of the largest industries in Brevard County, with 33,411 private jobs in 2024, while medical device manufacturing is small, with 168 jobs.

Private hospitals in Brevard averaged 7,587 jobs at 34 establishments in 2024 with average annual pay of $65,317 (BLS QCEW). Medical equipment and supplies manufacturing counted 20 establishments and 168 jobs, with a location quotient of 0.33, meaning the county holds about a third of the national share of jobs in that industry (BLS QCEW). That figure is worth knowing before reading the biotech and medical devices guide: Brevard's strength is electronics and aerospace, and medical manufacturing is a small niche next to it.

Engineering services are larger. Architectural and engineering firms in Brevard averaged 7,243 jobs at 501 establishments in 2024, with a location quotient of 2.74 and average pay of $108,188 (BLS QCEW). The healthcare industry guide covers the Melbourne hospital systems as employers.

Among the 41,116 employed Melbourne residents counted in the Census ACS 2020-2024 estimates, 12.5 percent work in manufacturing and 21.4 percent in education, health care and social assistance.

These are city-level figures for the people who live in Melbourne, wherever they work, from the Census Bureau's American Community Survey 2020-2024 5-year estimates; manufacturing accounts for 5,157 Melbourne residents (U.S. Census Bureau ACS 2020-2024). They differ from the county job counts above, which count jobs at Brevard County workplaces regardless of where the worker lives. A Melbourne resident may commute to an L3Harris building in Palm Bay or to a Northrop Grumman office by the airport, and both commutes show up differently in the two federal series.

The two numbers together explain why the Melbourne industry section splits the way it does: one guide for each of the manufacturing clusters that pay well above the Brevard County average, and one for health care, part of the education, health care and social assistance group that employs the largest share of Melbourne residents, 21.4 percent.

The City of Melbourne Economic Development Division works to attract, retain and expand private investment in the city, which calls itself the business hub for South and Central Brevard County.

The division coordinates capital projects inside Melbourne's Community Redevelopment Areas, which have their own advisory committees for downtown Melbourne and the Olde Eau Gallie Riverfront, and points employers to local and state incentive programs, grants, opportunity zones and relocation resources, working with Brevard County and State of Florida partners (City of Melbourne Economic Development). City Hall is at 900 East Strawbridge Avenue, Melbourne, FL 32901, phone 321-608-7000 (City of Melbourne). Last verified: October 14, 2026, on the City of Melbourne Economic Development page and the BLS QCEW Brevard County file.