Invest in defense innovation
with eyes wide open

Stirling Defense Ventures is an early-stage advisory relationship for sophisticated defense-technology investors. We occupy a deliberate position in the deal lifecycle: before the Tier-1 diligence firms, investment banks, and outside counsel are retained, and before the capital and fee commitments that come with them. What we provide in that window is landscape awareness across your chosen technology categories, access to the relationships that make opportunities actionable, and the scenario-level information that lets you decide which opportunities are worth the expensive next steps. We are not a fund, not a diligence firm, not a broker-dealer, and not a substitute for Tier-1 legal or consulting partners. We are the relationship and intelligence layer that sits in front of them.

No. Stirling Defense Ventures is not a registered investment advisor under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, is not a registered broker-dealer under the Securities Exchange Act, and does not act as a securities intermediary. Our work is early-stage landscape awareness and relationship facilitation — not securities recommendations, not transactional execution, and not the registered legal or regulatory work that follows. Securities-related advice, filings, and registered transactional activity remain the responsibility of your own counsel and any formally registered advisor you retain for the transaction.

A three-phase engagement model matched to the deal lifecycle, deliberately sized for early-stage landscape and relationship work rather than the heavyweight diligence that follows. Explore is an ongoing retainer: monthly landscape briefings across the MIL-STD-881 taxonomy categories you select, opportunity surfacing and competitor-intelligence reads, and relationship access when fit is apparent. Capture is engaged when you move toward a Letter of Intent on a specific target: scenario-level mapping, initial structure discussion, and a clean hand-off to the Tier-1 diligence firms and outside counsel who will conduct the formal work. Manage continues post-close as a relationship and intelligence asset for the life of the investment. A setup fee applies per taxonomy at engagement start and is waived for clients who commit to a three-year term. Specific fees are framed in the confidential Briefing and agreed in writing before any work begins.

Under Explore, you receive monthly landscape briefings in your taxonomies, opportunity surfacing before deals become public, initial technology and IP reads on companies in scope, competitor-intelligence notes, and facilitated introductions when fit is apparent. Under Capture, once you have selected a target, we provide initial scenario mapping — the structural sketch, the early IP and regulatory read, and the pre-engagement information you need to decide whether to commission Tier-1 diligence and outside counsel and, if so, whom; we help you select and brief those partners so they begin their work with context rather than from zero. Under Manage, you receive quarterly portfolio intelligence, ongoing relationship maintenance, and introductions into the U.S. defense contractor network for your portfolio companies' revenue ramp. What we do not do, and do not price for: full legal diligence, regulatory filings, valuation modeling, closing mechanics, formal opinions, and boots-on-the-ground company visits at scale — each of which is either retained separately as a premium scope element or conducted entirely by your Tier-1 partners.

In that case we move directly into the scope of Capture, targeted at the company you have named. We provide scenario-level mapping on the target, initial technology and IP reads, early introductions into the founders and the technical team where they are useful, and help selecting and briefing the Tier-1 diligence firm and legal counsel who will conduct the formal pre-close work. What we contribute in that context is time compression and relationship access: the Tier-1 partners you retain arrive with context, with the right questions, and frequently weeks ahead of where they would be starting cold. Explore is not a prerequisite if your conviction in the category and the target is already formed.

Ukraine is the most active category today given the combat-validation dynamic, and our firsthand presence is strongest in Kyiv, Lviv, and Warsaw. The same engagement framework extends across the allied innovation ecosystem: South Korea, Japan, Australia, India, Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Israel, and the broader NATO partner network. In geographies where we do not hold direct presence, we coordinate through an international network of IP counsel, regulatory specialists, and technical advisors whose work is routed through Stirling rather than delivered by us. Additional on-site engagement beyond the standard retainer is scoped separately as premium work.

Neither. You do, or the target company does, depending on transaction structure. Our contribution is an initial regulatory mapping — sufficient for you to estimate timelines, scope likely costs, and run the "what if" scenarios that inform whether to pursue a target at all. The refined mapping, the formal filings, and the definitive regulatory opinions are prepared and executed by your counsel and your retained regulatory consultants, who bring the professional expertise — and the professional insurance — that this class of work requires.

No. Stirling provides strategic and commercial advisory grounded in relationships and early-stage landscape work. Legal advice — securities, corporate, transactional, IP filings — is delivered by your own counsel, with whom we coordinate. Steven Thrasher is a U.S. patent attorney, and that regulatory background informs how we structure our IP landscape work; but within the Stirling Defense Ventures engagement, his role is advisory and relationship-focused, not representational. The separation is deliberate and disciplined. It preserves our independence on the deal side, it keeps our scope within the professional-insurance envelope appropriate to our fee structure, and it ensures that when Tier-1 counsel and diligence firms step in, they do so without an incumbent advisor's prior legal opinion already shaping their work.

The Explore retainer delivers its value whether or not any single transaction materializes. The monthly landscape briefings, opportunity surfacing, and competitor-intelligence reads give you awareness of defense-technology moves while they are still moves — not after a competitor has closed a deal and you read about it in the trade press. Over the course of a retainer, what accumulates is a working map of the category, a set of relationships you can activate when the moment is right, and a track record of opportunities you chose to pursue and opportunities you chose to pass. Capture fees and any closing bonus activate only when actual deal activity begins on your side.

No equity. No carry. No percentage commissions. For transactions that close under our advisory, a flat tiered closing bonus applies — structured as a flat fee per deal-size tier rather than a percentage of deal value, and materially below the three-to-five-percent transaction fees typical of defense broker-dealers. The flat-fee structure is deliberate on two grounds: it keeps us clear of the contingent-fee regulatory concerns that shape U.S. federal contracting, and it aligns our incentive with closing the right deal rather than chasing the largest one.

Every engagement opens with a mutual NDA. Your thesis, your target list, and your opportunity pipeline are treated as client-confidential and are shared only within the Stirling team assigned to your engagement. Target companies we approach receive only the capability signal needed to assess fit — never your identity, your thesis, or your valuation range — until you explicitly authorize direct introduction. Materials, call notes, and engagement documents reside within an access-controlled environment rather than a general correspondence archive.

We disclose overlap the moment we identify it, and we do not represent both sides of a transaction. When two client theses converge on a single target, we inform both sides, keep the subsequent work separated, and let the target company decide which engagement to advance first. For investors who want that conflict eliminated at the outset, we offer category-exclusive engagements as a premium tier of the relationship — structured so that, within your chosen MIL-STD-881 taxonomies, no competing investor engagement is accepted during the exclusivity term. Conflict disclosure, regardless of tier, is a written protocol rather than a matter of discretion.

A 60-minute confidential Briefing. We discuss your investment thesis, the geographies and technology categories that matter to you, the risk tolerances and minimum-check sizes that frame your engagement needs, and the landscape we are actively seeing. No fees and no commitment on either side. If we are not the right fit for what you are trying to do, we will say so directly — and, where we can, point you to an intermediary who may be more appropriate for your needs.