A rare look at exits, acquirers, and defense startup timing
Most founders still think defense is slow, opaque, and impossible to break into.
Brad Harrison makes the opposite case. In this episode, he explains why the shift to AI, autonomy, and electronic warfare is forcing the U.S. defense ecosystem to modernize faster than legacy procurement was designed to handle, and where that creates openings for startups. He maps the categories he believes matter most now: GPS-denied navigation, communications infrastructure, edge processing, supply-chain resilience, space domain awareness, and full-stack autonomy.
He also gets specific about what founders miss: in defense, great technology is not enough. The winners are usually built by operators who deeply understand the mission, the buyer, and the deployment environment. Brad walks through how those companies get funded, tested, and acquired, including the dynamics behind Scout’s Tomahawk Robotics win.
The cliffhanger is the big one: if Brad is right, the next generation of iconic venture outcomes may come from categories most traditional VCs still don’t understand. Watch the full episode to hear where he thinks the biggest opportunities are forming next.
Watch the full episode to see how Brad Harrison thinks about backing founders building the next generation of defense infrastructure.
Here’s what you’re in for:
01:43 – Why defense innovation is changing now
02:00 – What makes Scout Ventures different
04:19 – Why Army Futures Command moved innovation to Austin
06:45 – How autonomy went from assisted to independent
08:24 – Why Pentagon timelines break in modern warfare
10:52 – Where Brad is investing across the defense stack
13:12 – GPS-denied navigation and electronic warfare
24:44 – What categories are getting funded today
32:41 – How defense startups actually sell into DoD
41:05 – What a $100M+ defense-tech exit looks like
50:26 – Scout’s fund strategy and what founders should bring
52:48 – Why space is the next high ground
ABOUT Brad Harrison
Brad Harrison is the Founder and Managing Partner of Scout Ventures, an early-stage VC firm focused on national security and critical technology innovation. Scout says it invests in frontier technologies built by founders from the military, intelligence community, and national research labs, and leads seed rounds with follow-on capacity through Series B.
In this conversation, Brad brings a distinctive lens shaped by years spent helping founders navigate DoD demand signals, operator-led product design, and the long path from emerging capability to strategic acquisition. One of the strongest examples discussed is Tomahawk Robotics, which AeroVironment acquired in 2023 for $120 million in cash and stock
- Connect with Brad on LinkedIn
- Check out Scout Ventures
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