Funding the Final Frontier: How SpaceWERX is Rewriting Defense Innovation

In this Austinpreneur episode, recorded live at Fed Supernova 2025, host Nick Spiller sits down with Arthur Grijalva, Director of SpaceWERX, the U.S. Space Force’s innovation arm, to discuss how startups are reshaping national security in orbit. Grijalva explains how SPACEWERX connects entrepreneurs, private capital, and the military to accelerate technologies from concept to operations.

Listeners learn how programs like SBIR, TACT-FI, and STRAT-FI give startups staged funding that can grow from a few hundred thousand dollars to tens of millions, de-risking cutting-edge ideas before scaling them into Space Force programs of record.

For founders, this is a masterclass in how to enter the defense market; for investors, it’s a look at how federal capital and commercial dollars now work hand-in-hand to build the future of space infrastructure.

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