If 85% of defense M&A exits land below $100 million in enterprise value, why are so many defense tech founders raising at valuations unmoored from the fundamentals? Morgan Hitzig, General Partner at Overmatch Ventures, thinks the answer lies in who founders take money from and whether those investors understand budget cycles, colors of money, and what it takes to scale production.
Morgan walks Dave through how Overmatch deploys its oversubscribed $250 million fund across deep tech, defense, and space at the pre-seed to Series A stage. She introduces the "Founder Offset" thesis, where America's edge over China is thousands of founders nobody had to approve, and explains why supply chain single points of failure are where she sees the most urgent gaps.
Topics discussed:
- Deploying a $250M fund from pre-seed to Series A
- The "Founder Offset" thesis against China's central planning
- Spotting "forces of nature" founders on a first call
- Why inflated valuations risk defense tech longevity
- Mapping single points of failure across defense supply chains
- The "bring your own operator" syndrome in government sales
- How the Office of Strategic Capital changes venture math
- Understanding colors of money and budget cycles
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