Weekly News Update: Jun 14, 2024

8 - 14 Jun 2024

Good morning,

Clearly, I’m behind schedule today and there’s a lot to dissect in the news. First, the House Appropriations Committee did its committee markup on the Defense Appropriations bill this week. Watch for a lot of interesting insights to come in the near future on that.

Second, we’re continuing to see VC firms raising funds to focus on hard tech and defense tech. Hopefully, this will quickly translate into opening the spigot for startups, but that still remains muted—although there were some defense or defense-adjacent investments announced this week. More movement in the M&A sphere with Merlin Labs acquiring EpiSci and Italy finally approving French firm Safran’s acquisition of Eurofighter component maker Microtecnica.

Geopolitically, Israel rescued four hostages captures on 7 Oct, at the cost of several hundred Palestinian lives. The US has proposed a ceasefire plan, now endorsed by the UN Security Council, although Hamas has asked for some amendments. Russia is floating p…