1. Thesis: Space as the Final Frontier
There will be a time when we will think of capitalism as having two eras: the Earth Era, and the Space Era.
In the Earth Era, we were constrained by a finite supply of energy and materials, our particular atmospheric and planetary conditions, and a limited amount of land constantly creating governance conflicts. We will see that our goal was utilizing those finite resources in the most efficient way possible.
In the Space Era, our goal will be taking as many resources as possible, and expanding as much as possible. This isn't some kind of utopian dream: extracting resources from space and becoming multi-planetary is merely a technological problem, albeit an incredibly complex one.
Technology evolves in cycles, and each new cycle leverages the progress made in the previous one. Capitalism becomes more efficient as abstraction layers are stacked, thus enabling new entrepreneurs to "keep things for granted."
An internet entrepreneur today doesn't even think about renting virtual servers, let alone physical servers, let alone routers and cross-oceanic cables. They think about spawning a serverless function on AWS and taking payments with Stripe or crypto.
We believe space entrepreneurs will follow suit, and in a decade, they will be able to launch satellites without having to worry about building their own communications suite, or collision management, let alone reusable rockets. The speed of experimentation will grow exponentially.
The winners of the internet haven't been the ISPs, but the companies (worth trillions of dollars today) who were able to monetize on cheap and reliable access to billions of online customers. We believe space will give way to a similar cohort of winners, who will be able to monetize on cheap and reliable access to orbit and beyond.
It is impossible to predict the winning ideas resulting from technological revolutions. But it is possible to be directionally right on which vectors will yield the highest profit.
We cannot estimate the upside that space technologies will bring humankind, for space is (nearly) infinite. However we can estimate that, at the very least, space technologies will enable humankind to evolve past level I in the Kardashev Scale, and remove the "rare" from rare metals, unleashing a Second Industrial Revolution.
But now, unlike the First Space Race, the category is investable. It won't only be space agencies driving the Second Space Race forward; it will be startups, mainly in America and the West.
And unlike the First Space Race, the railroads have been laid: cheap and reliable access to orbit is a reality today, thanks to SpaceX.
Space is the final frontier, for there is no known frontier left after space. But the vaster the opportunity, the more paramount it is to take a thesis-driven approach to investing in it.
2. Opportunity: Energy, Metals, Compute and Beyond
Energy, rare metals and compute underpin our civilization. Energy is horizontal to any civilizational process (such as transportation, heating, manufacturing and recently LLM inferencing). Rare metals are horizontal to most key pillars like defense, compute and industry. Compute is horizontal to everything we do; from communications, to finance or even researching new drugs or materials thanks to recent AI models.
We see the space opportunity as having incredible upside, with a myriad new ventures that would seem unimaginable to us now, coupled with very steady floor given by the constant demand of more energy, more rare metals, and more compute.
Keeping in mind the early stage that the space industry is at, we consider that the best approach to drive outsized returns is to focus on:
a) the technologies that would allow space entrepreneurs to extract energy and metals, and run compute in space, and
b) the technologies that would collapse the cost of access to space and abstract away the maintenance of satellites and other spacecraft, allowing space entrepreneurs to launch new ventures that we cannot foresee today.
In order to provide structure to such approach, we have created what we called the \EDV tech tree\. The EDV tech tree represents our particular view of the sequence in which space technologies will develop, from lower in the stack and horizontal (infrastructure) to higher in the stack and vertical (applications).
This tech tree is an attempt to apply first-principles thinking to how the industry will develop. The tech tree is a living organism that will evolve as the industry shapes and the path forward becomes clearer.
The tech tree also helps us invest with a portfolio-based approach, backing companies that would be synergistic with each other.
Layer 0: Foundation (Built & Mature)
Reusable launch systems, basic satellite operations, and ground infrastructure.
Layer 1: Orbital Infrastructure (Built but Consolidating)
Satellite constellations and communications, on-orbit servicing and proximity operations, and autonomous navigation systems.
Layer 2: Advanced Capabilities (Emergent but Technically Feasible)
In-space logistics and refueling, orbital data centers and edge computing, advanced power systems, and debris management.
Layer 3: Resource & Manufacturing Infrastructure (Emergent to Future)
Space-based resource extraction, in-space manufacturing platforms, and advanced life support systems.
Layer 4: Applications (Various Stages)
Earth observation and analytics, space-based compute services, advanced materials and pharmaceuticals, and energy services.
3. Market structure
As we map the development of space technologies, we observe two distinct opportunity types emerging, each with unique characteristics that will shape how value is created and captured.
Infrastructure companies solve fundamental physics and manufacturing problems, creating moats that become nearly impossible to replicate once established. These ventures require massive capital, long development cycles, and deep technical expertise. However the winners will become the titans of the space economy. SpaceX exemplifies this: after 20 years and billions in investment, they now control approximately 90% of global orbital launch capacity by mass. The combination of proprietary technology, manufacturing scale, regulatory compliance, and operational experience creates compound advantages that define entire markets.
Application companies leverage the infrastructure layer to unlock novel use cases and business models. While infrastructure has significant technical unknowns, applications harbor the true unknown unknowns: second and third derivative opportunities that emerge only after foundational capabilities mature.
History teaches us this pattern: the internet enabled social media and streaming; mobile networks gave rise to the app economy and ride-sharing; cloud computing birthed AI platforms and global remote work. None of these were obvious when the infrastructure was being built, yet they created the majority of economic value.
Internet cables enabled a communications boom. Over time, the cost to launch an internet company collapsed, resulting in thousands of companies creating trillions of dollars in value. But to get there, it wasn't only the cables that were needed. It was the communication protocols. The programming languages. The datacenters. Then AWS, Stripe and other infrastructure that we see as basic today.
Back in the day and in a similar fashion, railroads had enabled a commerce boom like nothing before.
We believe the railroads for space are being laid down as we speak, which means the space market recently got investable.
During the first space race, space was reserved for governmental agencies and public efforts. SpaceX changed that, collapsing the price to access space by orders of magnitude.
Still there's a long way to go until space infrastructure gets to the point where software startups are in today. But it will get there with no doubt.
Just like with a piece of software, there are a number of dependencies before we can unlock the full suite of accomplishments that space technology will bring humankind. We have attempted to portray these dependencies in the form of a tech tree, starting from the most fundamental part laying the groundwork for everything else: cheap and reliable access to orbit. The tech tree is a living organism, and we have no doubt more branches will emerge as we progress towards the goal.
We have classified the technologies into:
a) built and mature (like reusable rockets);
b) built but still consolidating (like XXX);
c) emergent but technically feasible (i.e. no dependencies to start building right now, like XXX);
d) not built and still technically infeasible (i.e. at least one step removed in the dependency tree, like XXX).
This classification helps us understand technical readiness and dependency sequencing. Infrastructure technologies tend to cluster in categories (a) and (b), since they are the prerequisites being built now. Application opportunities increasingly emerge as infrastructure matures, with many falling into category (c) - technically feasible today, waiting for the foundational pieces to reach economic viability.
Like in every technological wave, new technology borrows from previous ones, but it often ends up becoming fundamentally different.
B2B
B2G
4. How we invest
Both infrastructure and applications are essential to realizing the full potential of the space economy. Infrastructure creates the foundation and the moats; applications create the diversity and the innovation. Our investment approach embraces both, recognizing that each requires different evaluation frameworks while contributing synergistically to the broader vision.
We invest with a thesis-driven approach in American companies (or exceptionally other Western allies) pushing the boundaries of space technologies. Our intention is to fund the development of the space technologies stack in sequential order, while selectively making early bets at opportunities further away in the stack, where we believe early involvement could be rewarded exponentially.
With EDV Ignition Fund, our core brand messaging and proactive sourcing efforts will focus on what we internally refer to as space infrastructure primitives. These are foundational elements such as tooling for satellite maintenance, rather than more specialized ventures further up the stack, like meteorite rare metal extraction companies. While we intend to be a lead investor in the EDV stack infrastructure and applications, we would collaborate and co-invest with funds we respect within the ecosystem, and help larger yet generalist funds with space-focused due diligence.
We will invest in early (seed) stage companies, mainly in the US. EDV is taking a multi-fund approach to investing, which will allow us to continuously develop and refine the thesis, adapting to the changing environment. We expect to make 25-30 investments during the fund’s 4-year investing period, writing check sizes averaging around $750k. To be in the position to meaningfully support teams we back further down the line, we intend to raise opportunity funds for follow on investments.
Key to our strategy is building a narrative that inspires the next generation of founders to build the key components leading us to becoming multi-planetary. As such, we intend to place a strong emphasis on the EDV brand and community. We have experienced what it is like to build companies, and empathy with founders is truly in our heart. We hope to build genuine, family-like relationships with those hopeful, bold, and visionary souls that commit their time (and nerves) to building a better world for us. Staying by their side is the least we can do, so investor-founder loyalty is core in our books.
Our partnership combines VC and founder experience into something we hope would make us useful to early stage teams: we won’t shy away from tech whiteboarding sessions, go-to-market brainstorming, brand workshops, or even internal crisis management (things get intense when you are building important, society-redefining ventures).
5. Market timing: The second space race
Neil Armstrong first walked on the Moon in 1969. For more than 50 years, no human has even been close to the moon. Two catalysts: one technical, one geopolitical - are converging to make space a priority again.
First, the technology to for cheap and reliable access to orbits is here. SpaceX demonstrated that launching can become a routine utility. Second, this technical unlock coincides with a geopolitical scenario: the United States and China are now locked in a head-to-head competition for space dominance. The result is a structural shift in how space is categorized; not as a frontier market for scientific or economic exploration, but as strategic infrastructure critical to national security.
The 2025 National Security Strategy of the United States treats economic security as national security, emphasizing reindustrialization, supply chain resilience, and sustained investment in “emerging technologies and basic science.” It calls out space directly as a priority domain for cutting-edge military and dual-use technologies (“undersea, space, and nuclear,” alongside AI, quantum, and autonomy).For a thesis like ours, built around infrastructure primitives, energy/compute, and a U.S.–China “Second Space Race” timing window, this matters: policy tailwinds tend to translate into investment expansion and urgency, particularly for foundational layers (launch, orbital infrastructure, resilience, autonomy) that enable everything above them.
I addition to these tailwinds, The Second Space Race creates distinct timing dynamics for infrastructure and application opportunities. Infrastructure becomes investable as technical barriers fall and capital efficiency improves—a threshold SpaceX has helped the industry cross. Applications become increasingly attractive as infrastructure matures and costs decline, creating expanding addressable markets for experimentation.
6. Sourcing and selection criteria
Our sourcing and selection process is designed to mirror the thesis-driven, long-cycle nature of space investing. We do not optimize for deal volume, but for depth of understanding and long-term asymmetry. Given the capital intensity, technical risk, and extended timelines inherent to space, the quality of initial selection is the primary driver of outcomes.
Thesis alignment and layer positioning: we prioritize companies that sit at, or unlock, higher layers of the stack, or that provide clear step-function improvements to lower layers. We also look for credible paths to 10×–100× improvements in cost, performance, reliability, or scalability relative to the status quo.
Technical inevitability over timing: we favor technologies that are physically and economically inevitable given current trajectories, even if market readiness is premature. Being early is acceptable; being wrong on direction is not.
Founding team: Exceptional companies are built by outstanding individuals. We place particular weight on founders who deeply understand the technicals of their product and segment and can combine them with capital discipline.
Capital efficiency across the full cycle: While space is capital-intensive by nature, we assess whether progress scales linearly or non-linearly with capital deployed. Businesses that unlock new optionality without proportional capital increases are strongly preferred.
Our sourcing and selection criteria are an expression of patience. Space rewards those who are directionally right and structurally prepared long before outcomes are obvious. Our goal is not to predict which applications will dominate, but to consistently back the technologies and teams that make those applications possible.
7. Lifecycle of an investment
Infrastructure and applications exist on a continuous spectrum with fundamentally different maturation timelines. Unlike traditional software ventures where infrastructure and applications can evolve in parallel, space infrastructure companies must overcome significant technical and physical barriers before applications can fully flourish. However, this doesn't mean applications must wait. Visionary founders are already planning and building tomorrow's applications on maturing infrastructure.
Understanding and embracing these different lifecycle dynamics is central to our investment strategy. Infrastructure investments are longer-term bets that require patience through technical development cycles, but they unlock entire categories of faster-moving application opportunities. Our portfolio approach balances these timelines: backing the foundational technologies that will define the space economy while selectively investing in applications that either leverage existing infrastructure or are positioned to capitalize on emerging capabilities.
Infrastructure companies typically require 3-5 years to reach orbit validation and 7-10 years to achieve commercial scale. This timeline reflects not just technical complexity but the realities of launch schedules, regulatory approvals, and the iterative nature of space systems development. Capital requirements escalate significantly through these stages, often reaching $50-100M+ before achieving sustained commercial operations. The technical risk is highest in the Testing and Deployment phases, but companies that successfully navigate these stages often find themselves in highly defensible positions with significant barriers to entry for competitors.
Application companies shouldn't wait for perfect infrastructure. Some applications can launch today with existing infrastructure: Earth observation analytics leveraging current satellite constellations, space insurance underwriting using available orbital data, or logistics optimization for existing launch providers. These companies can reach revenue within 18-24 months and scale within 4-6 years, following lifecycles more similar to traditional enterprise software companies.
Public/secondaries
8. Value and valuations
Infrastructure space companies behave more like pharmaceutical development, especially at the start: value accretes discontinuously upon clearing technical and commercial thresholds (first successful test, payload deployment, multi-year government award, etc.). Consequently, our valuation framework is built around de-risking milestones and the type of moat being built, more than around near-term financial metrics.
Hard-tech infrastructure and downstream applications create and capture value through different mechanisms and must not be valued through an identical model.
For infrastructure assets (think launch vehicles, propulsion systems, satellite buses, ground stations, and in-space manufacturing) we apply two litmus tests to distinguish durable value from commodity supply:
- System defining: Does the asset constitute a mission-critical dependency for broad classes of space operations. Infrastructure that is system-defining exhibits high switching costs and network effects.
- Scale defining: Can the asset achieve manufacturing scale along a steep learning curve where yield improvements, cost reductions and reliability compounding create an advantageous cost position? Scale-defining assets generate nonlinear unit-costs improvements on capital deployment.
We accept that the median outcome can be poor, because the winner outcome is enormous. But we only play when we have high conviction the company can become key infra and not just a commodity supplier.
Applications sit higher in the stack and typically exhibit lower binary technical risk, faster iteration cycles and business models similar to that terrestrial data products. However, space-native moats differ from pure software.
One source of confusion when valuing space is that public companies seem to demonstrate a duality in valuations: space as mature infrastructure vs. space as platform optionality.
Mature, cash-generative satellite infrastructure can trade like industrial/telecom assets with multiples that look closer to traditional infra than to SaaS.
On the other hand, high-growth “platform narratives” can command extraordinary revenue multiples even in public markets, reflecting belief in long-term category dominance rather than near-term profitability.