Trae Stephens | $1B+
Get in touch with Trae Stephens | Trae Stephens, partner at Founders Fund and cofounder and executive chairman of Anduril Industries, is one of the key investors and operators behind the rise of defense technology. A former early Palantir employee focused on intelligence and defense work, he helped launch Anduril in 2017 and has backed companies at the intersection of national security, AI, autonomy, and hard tech. Anduril was valued at $30.5 billion in 2025, making Stephens one of the most prominent figures in Silicon Valley’s defense-tech boom.
Trae Stephens (born November 1983) is an American venture capitalist and technology entrepreneur. He is a co-founder and the executive chairman of Anduril Industries, a defense technology company, and since 2014 a partner at Peter Thiel's venture capital firm Founders Fund. Stephens was an employee at Thiel's Palantir Technologies starting in 2008 and has been noted for his work at the intersection of technology and national security.
He is a devout Christian and has preached to tech entrepreneurs. His wife started a Christian nonprofit called ACTS17 to minister to elites; it funded Peter Thiel's 2025 lectures on the antichrist and events by Garry Tan, featuring Pat Gelsinger.
In June 2025, after Anduril's Series G, Stephens became a billionaire.[1][2]
The outlet Newcomer remarks that Stephens "has done as much as anyone to bring military technology into the venture capital mainstream.[3]
Early life
Trae Stephens grew up in Lebanon, Ohio. He was a senior in Lebanon High School at the time of the September 11 attacks, an event which inspired him to pursue a career in national security. Stephens attended Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, where he focused on Arabic and Security Studies and earned a degree in Regional and Comparative Studies (Middle East) in 2005. During his college years, he gained early experience in government and international affairs. He interned in the office of Republican congressman Rob Portman and at the Embassy of Afghanistan in Washington, D.C., shortly after the establishment of Hamid Karzai’s post-Taliban transitional government.[4]
Career
After graduating from Georgetown, Stephens began his career in computational linguistics working within the US Intelligence Community. He does not disclose the name of the specific agency he worked for.[5] He worked as "a computational linguist building enterprise solutions to Arabic/Persian name matching and data enrichment".[6] He said, "I'd say twenty percent of my time was literally just running searches and merging database files. This was taking up a full day out of every week. I thought I was going to show up and it would be this James Bond thing –they'd give me a supercomputer and the keys to an Aston Martin. Instead, it was a joke."[7] In 2008, he joined the Silicon Valley data analytics firm Palantir Technologies as one of its early employees. He led teams focused on expanding business in the defense and intelligence sector, on international growth, product development, and helped design analytical software. He served briefly as an adjunct faculty member at Georgetown University.[6]
According to tech writer[8] Mario Gabriele, when Stephens was at Palantir, Alex Karp, the CEO, told him that he would not let Stephens meet Thiel because he would be poached from Palantir. Karp managed to keep the two separated for two years, until 2012. Stephens began to work for the Founders Fund in 2013.[9] It is known that he has a close relationship with Thiel at the Founders Fund.[10]
In 2014, he became a partner at Founders Fund, where he has focused on investments in startups in the government and defense technology. In late 2016, Stephens served on President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team, where he led the Department of Defense transition effort.[11][12]
In 2017, Stephens co-founded Anduril Industries alongside Palmer Luckey, the founder of Oculus VR and fellow former Palantir colleagues Matt Grimm, Joe Chen, and Brian Schimpf. The idea for Anduril arose in 2014, when Stephens met Luckey at a Founders Fund retreat, where they bonded over the idea of applying Silicon Valley startup techniques to the defense sector. Anduril (named after a legendary sword in The Lord of the Rings) set out to build advanced autonomous weapon systems and autonomous surveillance technology.[13][14]
The company’s first major project was a “virtual border wall” – a network of sensor towers and drones designed to detect unauthorized crossings on the U.S.–Mexico border.[15] Under Stephens's and Luckey's leadership, Anduril quickly expanded its product line to include counter-drone systems, autonomous aircraft, and other AI-driven defense hardware. As chairman of Anduril, Stephens has helped the company secure significant contracts with the Department of Defense and allied nations. By early 2024 the company was valued at approximately $8.4 billion.[16]
He co-founded a company called Sol (at one point Sindarin Inc.) in 2021, which developed a next-generation wearable e-reader device.[17][18][19][20]
In 2020, he co-founded Varda Space Industries with Thiel fellow Delian Asparouhov and former SpaceX engineer Will Bruey (CEO). He also sits on the board of directors.[21]
In 2024, he co-founded Valinor Enterprises, a "company of companies" (incubator or accelarator), alongside former Palantir's senior vice president Julie Bush (CEO), General Catalyst's Paul Kwan and Red Cell's Grant Verstandig.[22][23][24] The team is sourced from Palantir Technologies, Anduril Industries and Helsing. The firm also holds strategic relationships with these companies. Each of Valinor's product comes with its own product company, which acts as a lean subsidiary of Valinor's. In a year (from its 2024 founding to 2025), Valinor has launched 10 such product companies. It has also launched Valinor Streamline, "the first third-party application installable in Palantir Foundry".[25][26] Valinor participates in Anduril's Lattice Partner Program,[27][28] and the two companies are also members of the Defense Industrial Base Consortium.[29] Valinor's announced products include a mobile field hospital named Harbor[27] and a mobile drone charging station named Dispatch.[30]
Anduril, Sol, Varda and Valinor were incubated or co-incubated by the Founders Fund. Among these companies, Sol is the sole non-military company.[31][21]
Stephens also sits on the board of Flexport (he led the Founders Fund's investment in the company).[32]
He is a commissioner at the Atlantic Council Commission on Software-Defined Warfare.[33]
He served as federal advisory committee member on the Defense Innovation Board (DIU) chaired by Eric Schmidt and co-authored a software acquisition study for the DIU in 2019.[34][35][18]
Personal life
Stephens has spoken openly about the influence of his personal beliefs on his professional endeavors. He is a devout Christian, and in June 2024 he garnered attention for preaching a sermon to a gathering of tech entrepreneurs about the intersection of Christian faith and innovation.[36]
Stephens is married to Michelle Stephens and they have two sons.[37] In a 2024 TechCrunch interview, he mentioned that his wife has made him promise never to run for public office, despite his involvement in government advisory roles. He is also personally interested in prepping: in the same interview, Stephens revealed that he has built an emergency bunker and keeps a survival kit.[16] His wife founded ACTS 17 (Acknowledging Christ within Technology and Society), a Christian nonprofit to minister to elites. After Peter Thiel gave a speech at her husbands 40th birthday in 2023, she realized "ministering to elites is just as important as Christian teachings about ministering to the poor." ACTS17 funded Peter Thiel's 2025 lectures on the antichrist and events by Garry Tan, featuring Pat Gelsinger.
Trae Stephens is an American entrepreneur and venture capitalist renowned for co-founding Anduril Industries, a defense technology company specializing in autonomous systems for national security, where he serves as executive chairman.[1][2]Stephens began his career with early operational roles at Palantir Technologies, contributing to its foundational work in data analytics for government applications.[3] He later joined Founders Fund as a partner in 2014, focusing investments on innovative startups, particularly those intersecting with government and defense sectors.[2] His leadership at Anduril emphasizes advanced technologies like AI-driven surveillance and weaponry to modernize military capabilities, bridging venture capital expertise with strategic national security needs.[4]
Career
Palantir Technologies
Trae Stephens joined Palantir Technologies in 2008 as an early employee, when the company had fewer than 100 staff members.[5] He began in a Forward Deployed Engineer role, a position common among Palantir alumni who later founded startups, involving hands-on implementation of data analytics solutions for clients.[6]During his tenure, Stephens led teams dedicated to expanding Palantir's footprint in the intelligence and defense communities, contributing to the firm's growth in government-related applications of big data analytics.[1] His efforts focused on operational deployment of Palantir's software platforms to address complex data integration challenges in security sectors.[5]This experience at Palantir provided Stephens with foundational insights into leveraging technology for national security needs, informing his subsequent interests in defense innovation.[1]
Founders Fund
Trae Stephens joined Founders Fund as a partner in 2014, focusing on investments across various sectors with a particular emphasis on startups in the government and national security domains.[2][3]In this role, Stephens contributed to the firm's portfolio by leading key deals, such as the investment in supply chain logistics platform Flexport, which highlighted his strategic approach to scalable technology applications.[3] His prior operational experience informed decisions targeting high-impact areas, helping integrate venture capital principles into traditionally risk-averse sectors like defense technology.[2][7]Stephens' involvement has bolstered Founders Fund's influence in bridging Silicon Valley innovation with government-oriented ventures, prioritizing autonomous systems and security-focused enterprises.[2]
Anduril Industries
Founding
Trae Stephens co-founded Anduril Industries in 2017 alongside Palmer Luckey, Brian Schimpf, Joseph Chen, and Matt Grimm.[3][8] The company was established to develop software-defined autonomous systems aimed at transforming national security and defense technology.[2][1]From its inception, Anduril's core mission centered on leveraging advanced AI and autonomy to address gaps in traditional defense procurement, emphasizing rapid innovation over legacy hardware-centric approaches.[9] Stephens contributed by drawing on his venture capital experience at Founders Fund to identify market opportunities in defense tech and facilitate early strategic alignments.[2][8]
Chairmanship
Trae Stephens serves as the Executive Chairman of Anduril Industries, providing strategic oversight on board-level decisions and guiding the company's direction in defense technology.[1][2] In this capacity, he has contributed to Anduril's evolution as a leader in software-driven autonomous systems designed to enhance national security capabilities.[9]Under Stephens' chairmanship, Anduril has advanced its portfolio of AI-powered hardware and software solutions, focusing on autonomous platforms that integrate data analytics for real-time threat detection and response.[9] These developments emphasize ethical AI deployment and accelerated innovation in defense contracting, positioning the company to challenge traditional industry models.[9]Stephens' leadership has been recognized for effectively bridging venture capital expertise with defense technology imperatives, leveraging his background to foster investments and partnerships that propel Anduril's growth in autonomous systems.
Disclaimer: This profile is based on publicly available information. No endorsement or affiliation is implied.
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