Interlune’s Post

Incredibly proud to announce the 'FUSE Space Program' alonsgide Brendan Wales, where we'll be writing $1M Pre-Seed checks (total $10M or more) to help day-zero founders build their pioneering vision in space into a reality. We've already had the privelege of partnering with Lumen Orbit (YC S24) and Quindar, and are hungry for more. 🛰️   The financial/logistical barrier to orbit has never been lower. Falling launch costs have driven enormous growth in the number of active satellites in orbit, and the underlying infrastructure to support this new space economy is being built as we speak.   As a part of this initiative, I compiled a market map of the Pacific Northwest space companies that make this region second-to-none.    Companies like Blue Origin (congrats again New Glenn!), Amazon Project Kuiper, SpaceX Starlink HQ'd in the Seattle area, where >80% of US satellites launched in 2024 were designed and built, have created an ecosystem of phenomenal engineering talent.   This talent is fuel for startups innovating across novel satellite constellation applications, propulsion systems, reusable rockets, in-space logistics, human spaceflight, power, manufacturing, and of course the software stack to support the space economy. It's tricky to bucket certain orgs that have multiple capabilities, so eager to hear feedback on this!   The nation is taking note, with Seattle startups like Stoke Space ($260M Series C this week!), Starfish Space, Gravitics Inc, Interlune, and Lumen Orbit (YC S24) and more attracting significant outside VC dollars to fund growth.   A few areas I'm interested in, in no particular order: 🔺Satellite cybersecurity 🔺Downlink 🔺Alternative PNT 🔺Onboard edge computing 🔺Satellite servicing/logistics 🔺Ground stations in orbit 🔺Startups pushing the orbital limits into VLEO/extreme-geostationary   Email me at 'nolan@fuse.vc' if you're working to help build the Space Race 2.0 - I'd love to chat.    Special thanks to folks like Nate Hamet 🛰, Philip Johnston, Adi Oltean, Sandilya (Sunny) Bhagavathula, John Conafay, Ari Juster, Andrew Redd, Rob Meyerson, Nick Khormaei, Aaron Hartman, Ben Straughan, Christopher Le and many more for your help/expertise/connections as I've jumped headfirst into the fun world of satellites. :)   Read more here! 🧑🚀 GeekWire: https://lnkd.in/eSBXvZip (thanks Alan Boyle for the wonderful writeup!) Payload: https://lnkd.in/epzVn2F6