Berlin-based drone maker Stark has hired its investor and Project A general partner Uwe Horstmann as CEO, shortly after the firm invested in Stark’s latest $62m fundraise.
The roughly one-year-old Stark makes strike drones and other unmanned defence systems. Despite being without a CEO, it has recently expanded into the UK and begun acquiring companies with local Berlin startup Pleno. Stark is backed by investors including Sequoia Capital, In-Q-Tel, the NATO Innovation Fund and reportedly Peter Thiel.
Horstmann will help the company expand into new product categories including longer ranges, expand its production capacity and strike up new partnerships, Stark said; he will continue to be active in Project A’s investment activities, it said.
Horstmann cofounded the German VC Project A in 2012. A reserve officer in the German Armed Forces, Horstmann has long been an outspoken proponent of defence tech, making bets in startups like unmanned ground vehicles startup ARX Robotics as well as fellow unmanned surveillance drone startup Quantum Systems.
Florian Seibel, the cofounder of Quantum Systems, founded Stark back in 2024 to build attack drones as he was unable to equip his drones with weapons owing to investors’ limitations around backing munitions; he is not currently involved in the day-to-day at Stark but remains a founding investor.
