With defense momentum growing, NATO Innovation Fund will update its investment team

Two years after securing $1 billion in commitments from more than 20 countries, the NATO Innovation Fund (NIF) enters a new chapter marked by the arrival of two new partners and the departure of founding team partners.

In the context of increasing military spending across NATO members, investment in double-use technologies has skyrocketed since the initiative was first announced in 2021.

This boom should give the NIF the benefits of a first me bar, but the fund was hampered by management challenges and a series of well-known departures. After the 2025 NATO Summit in The Hague reaffirmed its importance last June, NIF is now emerging with a nearly entirely new investment team.

NIF originally had four partners and one managing partner, but now it consists of three partners. Those familiar with NIF said the three-partner structure in this flat will remain intact for the foreseeable future.

The two partners are new hires. These are Ulrich Quay and Sander Verbrugge, based in Amsterdam. A German citizen, Quay has recently been responsible for corporate investment as BMW’s vice president and previously founded and led the corporate venture fund BMW I Ventures. Verbrugge, a Dutch student with a PhD in molecular biophysics, was previously a partner at the Deep Tech VC Fund Innovation Industries.

The third partner is London-based VC Patrick Schneider-Sikorsky. He is the last member of the former investment team.

Along with new recruits, the fund has announced the departure of founding team partner Kelly Chen. Kelly Chen tells TechCrunch that it is her decision and that she will build a new venture. Another founding team partner, Chris O’Connor, left NIF with similar plans earlier this year.

Chen currently belongs to the boards of several NIF-backed startups, but will transfer the board’s responsibility once employment is terminated.

Some observers hope the fund will roll out its capital faster, but Kontesi said the NIF is “going on track to meet up.” [its] Invest your goals this year. NIF has made 19 investments since its establishment. With seven funds, including OTB ventures and 12 funds for 12 startups, Space Forge and Tekever will create dual-used drones.

Adding new partners with industrial and scientific backgrounds, no matter how impressive it is, may not satisfy those who wish that the fund could invest in Ukraine or pure defense, in response to the Russian war economy, in contrast to double use. However, the broader NIF paper is to “enable deep tech founders to address defense, security and resilience challenges.”

In the meantime, the NIF has stepped up its efforts on the defense. The team is deeply involved in developing NATO’s rapid recruitment action plan, with the aim of accelerating the adoption and integration of new technology products for defense. NIF is also building a mission platform group with strategic recruitment, including John Ridge, who was hired as Chief Adoption Officer in 2024 to help portfolio startups navigate military procurement.

As for the new partner, it was adopted again through a process VC Michael Jackson previously described as something similar to “building a boy band.” In other words, they didn’t team up based on shared history or chemistry. They were identified by the NIF board of directors and approved by the LPS.

This process may be inevitable for organizations that currently count 24 countries as limited partners, but are widely believed to be one of the reasons why their previous teams didn’t gel. This time, all three partners met through the recruitment process and “we were able to spend time together ensuring a smooth transition and positioning the team for long-term success,” Kontesi said.

In a statement shared solely with TechCrunch by NIF, Professor Fiona Murray, the vice-chairman of the NIF, he compared the organization with startups. “We are proud of what we have achieved, but as well as effective teams learning, experimenting and improving, we are more widely aware of the need to speed up processes, expand startup platform support, double the construction of ecosystems, and build sectors and capital stacks.”

Murray expressed pride in bringing together qualified teams that can work together effectively, creatively and quickly. “They will be able to move faster and more decisively to promote the Alliance’s technological agenda and support the best founders across European ecosystems,” she previously wrote in a joint statement with NIF Chairman Klaus Hommels.

While Hommels’ other activities as an investor have prompted questions about possible conflicts of interest, it appears that his role has not changed during the NIF’s recent LP meeting in Venice. The NIF appears to be set to learn more from its reorganization and help NATO become more resilient.

“In this next phase, the NIF vice-chairman will refocus on the opportunities for DSR, highlighting the construction companies that can promote industrial scale and truly support the ecosystem across Europe.”