Weapon Systems and Platforms
Autonomous and remote weapon systems, future robotics and drone warfare. Short-range, mid-range and deep-strike capabilities.
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What we connect
01
Defence startups
have credible innovation but no route to validate it against a real adversary, or have limited capital and little understanding of how to scale a company.
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Military
want to have effect on the battlefield and procure innovative, battlefield-proven weapon systems, and have few ways to tell which systems have actually been proven.
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Ukrainian battlefield experience
is what shapes future warfare in practice. Over the years we have built a wide network of people there whom we have supported and continue to support, and we keep learning from the Ukrainian experience.
Darkstar works at the intersection on battlefield realities from Ukraine, European capital and production, allied procurement. We invest where the three meet.
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Where we stand
50+
trusted combat units
Ukrainian combat units we work with directly, from field testing to feedback on what holds up.
1000+
companies in the pipeline
Built over two years of bootcamps, events and direct outreach. We also track a map of roughly 14,000 European companies who have already won defence contracts.
9
investments in the first year
Three are public, the rest are stealth.
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Mandate
What we will and will not invest in.
Fund
EUR 25M
Stage
Pre-seed and seed
Ticket
EUR 0.5M to 1.5M
Readiness
TRL 7+, exceptions at TRL 4
Focus
Military-use, selective dual-use
Geography
Pan-European, Ukraine
Military goods, not limited to dual-use
Guided munitions, remote and automated weapon systems, terminal guidance. Systems designed for a military application rather than a civilian market with a defence footnote. Dual-use technologies are in scope when they carry a clear national-security use case or a contracted defence customer.
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Future warfare capabilities
We invest in future warfare capabilities: what wins the war now, and what defends Europe next. The six areas below are where we spend most of our time.
Air Defence and Counter-UAS
Layered air defence and counter-UAS, from interceptor rockets to high-energy lasers.
Disruptive Communication Systems
Communications that keep working under jamming and GPS denial: mesh networks, resilient positioning, navigation and timing.
Surveillance and Intelligence
Sensing, reconnaissance and decision intelligence, from tactical situational awareness to strategic multi-domain analysis.
Electromagnetic Warfare and ELINT
Electronic attack, protection and signals intelligence, including drone-mountable systems.
Simulation, Training and Exercise Support
Simulators and tools that train commanders and units faster than live exercises alone, with telemetry for readiness analysis.
Defence AI cuts across all six. We back system integrators as well as critical component providers.
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What we have backed
Nine investments in the first year. Three are public, the rest are stealth.
Farsight Vision
Decision intelligence Ukraine / EstoniaDecision intelligence for people and robots.
Continuously updated 3D contextual awareness and AI-assisted scenario planning, so crews and autonomous systems can work the same picture. Processes imagery captured in GNSS-denied conditions.
SPECUsed across 100+ brigades in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
farsightvision.com ↗Deftak
Precision munitions Ukraine / EstoniaPrecision-guided munitions for drone deployment.
Drone-mountable weapon systems. Turns reconnaissance drones into precision strike platforms without GPS dependency. Integrates across quadcopters, fixed-wing UAVs, VTOLs and aerostats.
SPECCombat proven, at a fraction of legacy cost.
deftak.com ↗Stratis
Data engine and C2 Iceland / EstoniaOne data engine for space, time, shape and relationships.
An ultra-performant data engine that holds space, time, shape, entities and their relationships in one model and queries them in real time. Sovereign and secure by design. Built by the team behind Unity and Iceland’s open-data movement.
SPECIn continuous use by Ukrainian frontline units.
stratisintel.com ↗06
Working with us
For founders
If you build systems for a military customer, we are the investor that will ask how your capability fits the military operational context, and about your production line, before your TAM slide. Pre-seed and seed, EUR 0.5M to 1.5M, and end users in the room early.
Talk to usFor investors
A specialist manager with a mandate that includes single-use military systems, an Estonian regulated structure, and sourcing built on bootcamps and a network of more than fifty combat units.
Talk to usFor governments and armed forces
We map the European defence industrial base and run the events where units, ministries and manufacturers meet. If you are looking for a specific capability, we probably know who is building it.
Talk to us07
Coalition
We are actively bridging the gap between modern warfare challenges and the technologies needed to address them. We do this through equity investments, facilitating partnerships across various types of organizations, developing the defence tech ecosystem, resolving market barriers, and by bridging nations.
Future Army Camp
A Camp is a short, intensive programme designed specifically for defence tech startups, focused on real, deployable capabilities. What it does, in general terms, is close the feedback loop: it puts the companies building equipment together with the people who use it, alongside investors and government stakeholders, to validate and test technologies in realistic scenarios and build partnerships that last. The emphasis is on hands-on evaluation and direct, unfiltered feedback from end users.
futurearmy.camp ↗DefTech Forges
Darkstar co-delivers the BraveTech EU DefTech Forges, a European Commission and European Defence Agency initiative. Winning teams advance to operational experimentation with the EDA.
bravetecheu-deftechforges.eu ↗
European Commission
DG DEFIS, BraveTech EU DefTech Forges
European Defence Agency
Operational experimentation for Forges winners
Estonian Defence Forces
Cooperation through the Force Transformation Command
08
The rules we operate under
We invest in weapons. These are the constraints every investment operates under.
Read the four constraints
Meaningful human control
We invest only in systems designed for human-in-the-loop oversight. A human stays responsible for any use-of-force decision.
International humanitarian law
Every investment is screened against IHL and the Geneva Conventions. No tolerance for technologies that undermine civilian protection.
Regulated and audited
The fund is supervised by the Estonian Financial Supervision Authority and complies with Estonian law, including the Weapons Act and the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Prevention Act. Full AML and KYC on every counterparty.
Robustness and accountability
Aligned with the IEEE work on autonomous weapon systems: resistance to adversarial manipulation, independent test and evaluation, lifecycle risk assessment, and systems that log and explain their decisions.
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Team
Ragnar Sass
Co-Founder, General Partner ConnectKaspar Gering
Co-Founder, General Partner ConnectMart Noorma
Co-Founder, General Partner ConnectPhilip Jungen
Co-Founder, General Partner ConnectAlex Kinash
Co-Founder, Partner ConnectValeriia Sviripa
Chief of Staff, Partner ConnectMariana Khala
Ukraine Country Manager Connect10
In the news
The world according to Ragnar
On unmanned ground vehicles, procurement that has not changed yet, and a market getting cynical.
European Commission partners with the European Defence Agency on BraveTech EU
DefTech Forges phase one awarded to a consortium that includes Darkstar.
Farsight Vision secures EUR 7.2M to build full-stack drone autonomy
Led by Axon Enterprise and the SmartCap Defence Fund. Darkstar was the first cheque.
Stratis emerges from stealth to build a Palantir for Europe
Darkstar’s largest cheque to date.
European VC breaks taboo by investing in pure defense tech from Ukraine’s war zones
The fund launch, and why a European manager investing in weapons was news.
SmartCap invests EUR 10M in Darkstar’s defence-focused venture capital fund
The first investment ever made by the Estonian Defence Fund.
Riiklik Kaitsefond tegi esimese investeeringu
The state’s own account of backing the fund, and of Farsight moving its headquarters to Estonia.
Darkstar invests EUR 600,000 in a Ukrainian-Estonian high-precision bomb
The Deftak round.
Photographs by the publishers, shown with the stories they belong to.
Darkstar’s team has a unique network, outstanding collaboration projects in Ukraine, and no restrictions to invest in single-use military solutions.
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Talk to us
For teams building systems with a military end user. We read everything that comes through here. If it fits the thesis you will hear from a partner, not an analyst.
Encrypted at rest. Kept for 24 months after a decision, then deleted.
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Get in touch
Investors, government and military, partners, press, or anything that does not fit a box.
Encrypted at rest. Kept for 12 months after our last contact, then deleted.