Webinar
US Strategic Tech Fund Launch
Join Alumni Ventures’ Laura Rippy and Drew Wandzilak for an exclusive introduction to the US Strategic Tech Fund, a venture strategy focused on critical technologies shaping America’s future.
This fund targets startups at the intersection of national security and innovation—spanning AI, defense tech, advanced manufacturing, cybersecurity, and space. Laura and Drew will share the fund’s investment thesis, highlight early deal activity, and discuss how strategic venture capital can support both portfolio performance and national competitiveness.
Attendees will gain a better understanding of why these sectors matter, and how individual investors can gain exposure to them through this differentiated fund. Whether you’re already exploring national security-focused investments or just getting started, this session will offer practical insights and a unique opportunity. Reserve your spot today to learn more about how the US Strategic Tech Fund is aligning capital with impact.
Why Attend?
- HomeLearn about the fund’s mission and its focus on critical U.S. tech sectors
- HomeHear directly from the investment team about early portfolio companies and pipeline
- HomeUnderstand how strategic venture investing can align with both purpose and performance
Alumni Ventures is America’s largest venture capital firm for individual investors.
About your presenters
Laura brings operational perspective as a CEO, Chairman, and executive in technology startups in addition to investing experience. As Managing Partner at Ripplecreek Partners’ technology practice and General Partner at FA Technology Ventures, she worked various tech sectors: mobile, consumer, internet, SaaS, cloud-based, marketing, and enterprise software across many economic cycles. She also served as CEO at Handango, creating the first marketplace of mobile apps. At Microsoft, she co-founded two businesses as an intra-preneur in an elite swat team spun out of Bill Gates’ office. Laura holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and AB in Government from Dartmouth (’89).
Overview:
Drew Wandzilak invests in breakthrough technologies that matter to the real world—systems that generate power, move hardware, secure nations, or decode biology. He focuses on companies operating in high-heat, high-speed, high-stakes environments where technical performance is existential and strategic value is measured in megawatts, meters per second, or mission success. Across aerospace, energy, and defense, Drew backs founders who don’t just pitch vision—they bend atoms, trajectories, and supply chains to make it real.
Funds actively worked on:
Yard Ventures
Green D Ventures
U.S. Strategic Tech Fund
Investment Areas of Focus:
His investment lens prioritizes platforms over point solutions, scale advantages rooted in physics or manufacturing, and mission alignment with long-term public interest. That includes nuclear reactors that deploy like data centers, orbital vehicles that reshape access to space, hypersonic systems built for rapid iteration, and genetic tools that bring diagnostics to the edge. These aren’t just technical moonshots—they’re foundational bets on how the next century will be powered, protected, and personalized.
Drew led Alumni Ventures’ investment in Impulse Space, which is building the in-space logistics layer for a high-frequency orbital economy. He backed Aalo Atomics, a small modular reactor company designing standardized, factory-built nuclear power for grid-scale deployment. He also invested in Astro Mechanica, which is reinventing hypersonic aerospace testing for the modern battlefield, and Acorn Genetics, which is miniaturizing genomics to enable low-cost, distributed DNA testing anywhere.
These companies reflect Drew’s broader strategy: to invest in enduring platforms that serve strategic industries and unlock decades of downstream innovation. He believes the next great venture outcomes will come not just from apps or algorithms, but from reengineering the physical world—and the infrastructure that underpins it.
LEARN HOW TO INVEST IN COMPANIES IN THIS SECTOR WITH ALUMNI VENTURES: