Discipulus Ventures

Discipulus Ventures is an El Segundo, California-based pre-seed venture fund and residency, founded in 2024, backing a vanguard of founders solving America’s hardest problems in hardware, defense, and critical infrastructure. It closed an oversubscribed $30 million El Segundo Hardtech Fund in 2026. Its cohort residency relocates founders to El Segundo, embedding them in one of the densest hardware and defense-tech clusters in the country for intensive in-person mentorship, network access, and demo day preparation. It invests at pre-seed across defense, aerospace, energy, manufacturing, mining, and advanced computing, with checks around $175,000 on a capped SAFE plus a small upfront equity stake. Investments include Rune Technologies, Durin, Vanguard Defense, Framework Automation, Western Chemicals, and Athanor. Discipulus seeks young, deeply technical founders with hands-on industry experience and an almost obsessive attachment to a problem, often rooted in a family connection or deeper value, who are driven by national-interest challenges over market-map trends.