Defense technology startup Vannevar Labs Inc. has raised a $75 million funding round led by Felicis Ventures.
The Series B round, which was announced late Wednesday, also included the participation of a half dozen other investors. The group included DFJ Growth and Aloft VC, as well as returning backers General Catalyst, Point72 Ventures, Costanoa Ventures and Shield Capital. Since launch, the startup has raised more than $90 million in funding.
“We’ve been investing in frontier AI for over a decade and there are few applications of AI as important as defense technology,” said Felicis founder and Managing Partner Aydin Senkut. “Vannevar Labs has already demonstrated a strong ability to get innovative tech into the hands of the defense community.”
San Francisco-based Vannevar Labs develops technology products that support public servants working on military and foreign policy decisions. Its flagship offering, a software platform called Decrypt, launched in early 2021. The company says the platform has since been deployed across more than 15 government agencies.
In August 2021, following a $20 million Series A funding round, Vannevar Labs detailed that Decrypt can organize information collected by the intelligence community to simplify analysis. The platform is also capable of translating text. In conjunction with its latest funding round, the company detailed this week that Decrypt is used at more than 15 military bases for tasks such as processing battlefield information and countering malign activity by adversaries.
According to the startup, Decrypt generates more than $25 million in annual revenue. The broadening adoption of the platform has helped Vannevar Labs become profitable less than five years after launch.
Using the proceeds from its latest capital raise, the startup will work to win its first multiyear government technology procurement contract with Decrypt. Additionally, it will finance the development of new products. The startup previously stated that its product portfolio could expand to include as many as nine or 10 offerings in a few years.
“We exist to bring the best engineering and product talent to the most important national security problems,” said Chief Executive Officer Brett Granberg. “This funding will allow us to much more aggressively invest in R&D for the products we’re fielding with the government.”
The funding round comes a few weeks after another defense technology startup, Anduril Industries Inc., closed a $1.48 billion investment. Anduril develops a variety of defense systems that range from surveillance towers to drones. It also provides an operating system, Lattice, that can collect sensor data from defense systems and make it available to military personnel through a centralized interface.
