The NATO Innovation Fund, one of the biggest investors into defence and resilience technology in Europe, is going local. Today, it announced that it is opening a branch in Warsaw, a new operation designed to boost “engagement” in Poland and the wider Central and Eastern Europe region.
The idea will for the branch to work on business development for NIF portfolio companies — helping with procurement opportunities and building relationships that can lead to procurement. And it will potentially also boost dealflow for NIF itself: armed with a €1 billion+ fund, NIF is looking for more startups to add to its portfolio.
Jan Duthel will be leading the operation, and he and his team will “work directly with the region’s deep tech founders, investors, government and industry partners, as well as the defence and security community,” NIF said.
NIF is already somewhat involved in Poland and the region, as an LP in two Polish funds, Expeditions and OTB Ventures. But to date, it has not directly invested in any startups in the region, NIF confirmed to Resilience Media. That is something it wants to change.
Poland is not the biggest defence market in Europe in terms of overall value, but as a country it spends more proportionate to its GDP than any other nation within NATO. It’s also a very strategic country along the Eastern Flank: a direct neighbour to Ukraine and very much in the crosshairs of Russia’s ‘grey zone’ warfare manoeuvres.
There is a lot of room for growth in defence and resilience tech in Poland. Ironically, despite its front seat position to so much going on, it hasn’t seen as big of a defence tech ecosystem develop as other countries in the region such as Estonia and Latvia.
NIF’s move to build out a branch in Warsaw also comes at a critical time in defence and resilience tech in Europe.
As we noted in our recent report on defence tech fundraising, resilience technology startups in Europe (and elsewhere) are raising record amounts of money at the moment, on track to see $10.6 billion in funding this year. Part of that is because of the worsening geopolitical climate: Russia is getting more aggressive, and the US seemingly is less interested in protecting the region as it has in the past.
But while there has been a lot of talk about the urgent need to modernise militaries and to re-arm Europe due to the current geopolitical climate, actual procurement has been lagging behind.
Trying to address that is one reason why NIF brought on Ari Jónsson as NIF’s first president, to build more adoption pipelines; and it is also some of the logic behind setting up a branch now in Poland.
On the side of Poland, it gives the country some gravity as a central cog in the wider defence posture of the region.
“The NATO Innovation Fund’s decision to establish a permanent presence in Warsaw is a significant vote of confidence in Poland’s economy and its innovation ecosystem,” said Minister of Finance and Economy Andrzej Domański, in a statement. “The NATO Innovation Fund is the first major fund, not originating from Poland, to establish a substantial presence in our country, and this reflects the strength of our growth, our deep tech talent, and our ambition to be a leading hub for dual-use innovation in the region.”
