Anduril Cofounder Trae Stephens Is Now A Billionaire
Last week, Anduril announced that it had raised a mega funding round led by Founders Fund, valuing the company at more than $30 billion, doubling its valuation in less than a year.
The deal also minted a new defense tech billionaire: company chairman Trae Stephens.
The Forbes Midas List alum, who is also a partner at Founders Fund — which led the round with a $1 billion investment, its largest ever — owns more than 3% of Anduril, according to Forbes' estimates, pushing his net worth beyond $1 billion. Stephens and Anduril declined to comment.
Booming investor appetite for military startups has helped make Stephens the latest entrant to a group of billionaires who have built fortunes selling weapons systems to the government. His Anduril cofounder Palmer Luckey is worth $3.6 billion, Forbes estimates, while Alex Karp, the cofounder and CEO of military software firm Palantir is worth $11.9 billion.
Since launching in 2017, Anduril has been at the forefront of a new generation of venture-backed startups making weapons, drones and software for the military — an ecosystem that is increasingly being embraced by the Trump administration. Last month, Anduril emerged as a frontrunner alongside SpaceX and Palantir to develop a weapons system for Trump's proposed $175 billion Golden Dome for America plan, which aims to combat missile threats.
Stephens has taken an atypical route to becoming a Silicon Valley billionaire. After stints in multiple political offices and the intelligence community, he was an early employee at Palantir, which was cofounded by Peter Thiel. The famed investor convinced him to join Founders Fund in 2014 as a partner. There, he met Luckey during a retreat hosted by the investment firm, and the two developed the idea behind Anduril: applying a Silicon Valley strategy to a military-facing business.
At Founders Fund, Stephens has also backed other defense tech companies, including Gecko Robotics (valued over $600 million), which makes hardware and software to protect defense infrastructure, and Varda Space Industries (valued more than $500 million), which tests drugs and manufactures things like fiber optic cables in space. He also led the series A funding round into supply chain logistics startup Flexport (most recently publicly valued at $8 billion). That 'check that I wrote was maybe the best one, aside from' Anduril, he previously told Forbes.
Beyond Anduril and Founders Fund, Stephens, who ranked No. 19 on the 2025 Midas List, also is the cofounder of Sol, a startup making eyeglasses with Kindle-style lenses for "immersive reading' that last raised a seed funding round led by YC Combinator chief Garry Tan in 2023.
Stephens, who previously worked on President Donald Trump's transition team during his first term, was also considered for a senior Defense Department role this year, but it didn't materialize (citing one source, Semafor previously reported that some administration officials were concerned about Stephens' investments; Stephens declined to comment at the time).
At Anduril, which generated $1 billion in revenue last year, Stephens is aiming to scale up production of its suite of military products. The company, which sells drones, augmented reality helmets, sensors and software to connect them, raised $1.5 billion last year to build a factory in Ohio, called Arsenal-1, to rapidly scale up its production of aerial and maritime drones. And last month, Anduril announced it was partnering with Meta to make an AI-powered headset for the military.
The fresh $2.5 billion in funding, a series G round, will also be used to acquire new companies, and expand operations in Australia and Europe, spokesperson Shannon Prior told Forbes last week.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CBS News
3 minutes ago
- CBS News
Colorado county resumes program giving financial support to nonprofits
A program helping nonprofit organizations in Arapahoe County is resuming after being put on pause for a year. Since 2008, Aid to Agencies has given financial support to nonprofits providing critical services in the community. The program will return after Arapahoe County Board of County Commissioners redesigned it and its priorities. "The County decided to look at the data that we had available to us, as well as our community needs assessment and community health assessment, and we have decided we want to be much more strategic and be much more impactful with our service dollars," said Jill McGranahan, Arapahoe County's public information officer. Since starting the program, the county has provided about $27 million from its general fund to over 50 nonprofits that meet service gaps. McGranahan acknowledged, while some nonprofits have closed their doors recently and faced uncertainty, by using data, the county can better target resources where they're needed most. The county is concentrating on four priority areas -- housing and homeless services, food assistance, mental and behavioral health/substance abuse and transportation. "You'll really see that the alignment is there with these areas," McGranahan said. "We want to be good stewards of the taxpayers' dollars and get the biggest bang for it back. And we feel like, focusing on these areas, we're going to be able to do that." Integrated Family Community Services, which has been around for over six decades, relies heavily on outside support and grants from Aid to Agencies. The organization has a no-cost grocery store, providing food and other items to community members in need, and up to 72,000 people every year. In the last funding cycle, the organization received $20,000 in grants from the Aid to Agencies program, and that money helped a lot of people. "With the Aid to Agency grant, throughout the year, we can serve our 6,700 families or about 22,000 individuals," said Todd McPherson, the development director at IFCS. McPherson said, as demand grows, and other funding becomes limited, the return of the program is welcomed. "The Aid to Agencies grant is a really big difference in filling the void from a lot of other resources that are not renewed," McPherson said. "We subside on partnerships, and Arapahoe County and surrounding communities have been our biggest supporters over the last six decades." "We feel very grateful that we still have the funds within our general fund to support these community partners," McGranahan said. McPherson said the organization plans to apply for more grants from Aid to Agencies for the upcoming funding cycle. "We can give more people more resources through this grant," McPherson said. "About a quarter of our constituents come from Arapahoe County, and we serve people of all demographics and all needs, and the grant going a long way in helping people get through their societal obstacles," McPherson said. In turn, McPherson believes it will help residents such like Jackeline Ibarra, who benefits by being able to pick up groceries for her family at IFCS. "The economy is really crazy expensive right now, so this center has been a big help for us," Ibarra said. "I just really appreciate everyone, all the volunteers and the organization that's been super helpful for not only my family, but everybody else in the community." Aid to Agencies applications for the 2026 funding cycle close on Sept. 19. The Aid to Agencies Committee is also offering workshops to nonprofits to help during the application period. The sessions will provide guidance and information to nonprofits on eligibility requirements, application procedures and review process. To attend a workshop, register with Aid to Agencies. A virtual meeting link will be sent in advance of the workshop date. Arapahoe County also has more information about Aid to Agencies on the county website.
Forbes
3 minutes ago
- Forbes
How Data is Catching Pests And Revolutionizing Farming
Monarch CEO Praveen Penmetsa expects sales to triple or more this year as it gets its autonomous electric tractors in the hands of farmers, earning the Livermore, California-based company a coveted spot on our annual list of the Next Billion-Dollar Startups. But launching an agricultural equipment company is tough. It is capital-intensive, and cash-strapped farmers tend to be a conservative lot resistant to change. But Livermore-based Monarch, which has raised $116 million in equity from investors and reached a valuation of $271 million at its most recent equity funding in November 2021, seems to have hit a tipping point. Last year, it booked $22 million in revenue, up from $5 million in 2021. This year Penmetsa expects revenue to increase three- to fivefold. That would bring it above $66 million, and possibly over $100 million, as the number of its tractors in the field goes from more than 100 to 1,000. As it expands, Penmetsa expects that more of its revenue will come from software subscriptions (up to $8,376 per tractor per year) that give farmers real-time alerts about sick plants and safety risks, plus gathering and crunching a ton of data to improve crop yields.
Forbes
3 minutes ago
- Forbes
How AI Is Turning Manual Work Into Unlocked Potential
Conviction is a venture firm that aims to serve AI-Native, "Software 3.0" companies. In this interview, Conviction Founder Sarah Quo and Conviction Partner Mike Vernal speak with Forbes' Katharine Schwab to discuss the focus of Conviction's investing, what kind of founders they look for, and why they don't view AI as a zero-sum game.
