About this episode
Don’t miss our newsletter! Mike hosts Perry Boyle to dive into Ukraine’s rapidly developing defense industry. Perry co-founded MITS Capital (Military Innovation Technology Solutions), a US venture that just established the first defense tech accelerator in Ukraine. MITS’ vision is to revolutionize Ukraine’s defense industry by investing in Ukrainian defense tech startups, nurturing and developing the ecosystem, and rapidly maturing and scaling military tech solutions to the front lines. They are raising a $50M fund and just selected the first cohorts for the accelerator. We talk about the industry's ins and outs, compliance and regulatory blockers, the promising upside, Ukraine’s insanely fast innovation cycle, key investing insights, “winning” vs. “losing” the war, investing in peace, and much more. This episode is PACKED with insights, but we still had some fun along the way. You should expect nothing less! For those interested in #military #ukraine #warfare #nationalsecurity #defense #nationaldefense #investing #venture #vc ---- Links • Sign up for our amazing newsletter ! • Support us on Patreon ! • Mike Benitez (LinkedIn) • Perry Boyle (LinkedIn) • MITS Capital ---- Follow us on... • Instagram • Facebook • X (Twitter) • LinkedIn • Website ---- Show Notes (01:40) Intro (02:27) Y Combinator for Ukraine defense tech (03:10) what is an accelerator? (04:01) what problem is MITS trying to solve (05:28) MITS origin story (09:11) we do read the emails (10:43) MITS first investment (11:32) US companies in Ukraine (11:57) investing in Ukraine (12:54) buy when the cannons are firing (13:40) International support (14:19) the US role (14:31) Defense Innovation Unit (15:58) US defense budget pie (16:23) tech cycle vs. budget cycle (17:21) adaption and iteration in Ukraine (17:52) key investing insight (18:15) tanks (19:30) winning and losing (22:35) relevancy through proximity (23:26) grain and Kevin Bacon (24:22) 1000 to 5 (25:33) virtuous cycle (26:20) like Stanford and Silicon Valley (27:52) red lines and promises (28:51) partners and allies (29:29) fixing corruption (29:57) “new Ukraine” (31:23) MITS vs Brave1 (33:17) Brave1 year 1 metrics (34:47) Ukraine’s $10 Billion investing challenge (39:11) magnets (40:59) investor beware (42:17) investing in the victory (43:10) investing in the peace (43:23) outro