Why We Invested in Vatn Systems: The New Undersea Industrial Base

Undersea warfare has a math problem. For decades, the domain has been defined by a small number of exquisitely expensive, manned submarines. But as the ocean becomes the next critical contested frontier—crowded with vital internet cables, energy infrastructure, and increasingly aggressive shipping lane disputes—the model of few and expensive no longer works. We launched the Geodesic Alliance Fund to back founders tackling exactly this kind of hard, dual-use problem. That is why we are proud to invest in Vatn Systems, which recently announced its $60 million Series A.

When the Pentagon announced the Replicator initiative, the goal was clear: field thousands of autonomous systems to counter adversaries. But we cannot hand-build thousands of exquisite machines using today’s supply chain. The unit economics simply don’t close. When we visited Nelson Mills and the Vatn team in Rhode Island, they weren’t just trying to build a slightly smarter underwater vehicle; they were rethinking how these systems are made.

Their “Skelmir” vehicles are designed from the ground up for mass production. By solving the manufacturing bottleneck, Vatn can deliver high-speed, long-range autonomy at a price point where losing a vehicle isn’t a strategic catastrophe, meeting the Navy’s demand for next-gen attritable systems.

But this isn’t just a defense play. The same economics that solve the Navy’s ISR (Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance) problems are applicable to the commercial sector. Inspecting offshore wind farms, monitoring oil and gas assets, and surveying undersea cables are currently expensive tasks requiring crewed ships. Vatn’s fleet brings the cost of that data down by orders of magnitude.

We believe the next generation of DeepTech won’t just be about better software—it will be about scalable industrial capacity. Nelson and his team have the rare combination of technical capabilities and operational grit to pull that off. We are thrilled to jump in the water with the Vatn team.

Read the company announcement: Vatn Systems Raises $60 Million Series A to Redefine Underwater Naval Warfare at Scale