🇺🇦Full-cycle deftech ecosystem: accelerator (23+ companies), investment fund ($5M, 5 companies), sectoral capabilities. Reach out: [email protected]
Kyiv, Ukraine
Joined March 2024
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🇱🇹 Povilas Urbonas, Managing Partner of Ignition Fund by Startup Wise Guys, will mentor the Batch 4.0 teams.
Startup Wise Guys has backed 460+ startups since 2012, including Buntar Aerospace and Frontline Robotics in defence.
During Batch 4.0, Povilas will help teams get investor-ready, build an early round with European funds and angels and sharpen their go-to-market.
👉 Apply by 15 November: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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🔥 Meta Bureau joins DB Accelerator Batch 4.0 as a partner!
Meta Bureau, a Ukrainian developer and manufacturer of integrated UAV systems, will co-fund grants for the selected teams and share its engineering and manufacturing expertise.
With Meta Bureau, Batch 4.0 teams get:
🔹 additional grant funding from a manufacturer whose systems work on the battlefield
🔹 answers on production, component sourcing and field integration from engineers who deal with them daily
🔹 advice from a team that went from a 2022 prototype to serial production
👉 Apply by 15 November: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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🚀 The second wave of the Batch 4.0 open call is open: following requests from teams, applications are open until 15 November.
In the first wave, teams from 22 countries applied, with an average maturity of TRL 5. The second wave gives more teams the time to prepare a complete application.
Teams that applied in the first wave don't need to reapply.
👉 Apply by 15 November: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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🎙 Ivan Kaunov, Co-founder and CEO of @BuntarAerospace, will mentor the Batch 4.0 teams 1:1.
Buntar has closed two rounds above $10M in seven months: $10.4M led by @axon_enterprise and $16M led by Freedom Fund, about $30M in total.
During Batch 4.0 Ivan will share how Buntar raised from a strategic investor and funds, passed due diligence and scaled production.
👉 Apply for Batch 4.0: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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🇺🇦 Scaling a defence tech company takes capital. DB Accelerator Batch 4.0 gives you more than that.
We agree on priorities and milestones with each team, then match expert support and intros to those goals — from mapping funding instruments to prepping you for each investor meeting.
What you get:
🔹 Capital — base grant for every team, Demo Day with 250+ investors
🔹 Evidence — testing with 30+ military units, Field Demo Day with ~80 commanders
🔹 Legal and investment readiness — company, IP and equity set up with AEQUO
🔹 Quality — NATO AQAP requirements for your product
Apply by 30 Oct: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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🤖 DB Accelerator Batch 4.0 gets an AI track, developed with our co-founder @sigmaswgroup.
Sigma Software runs production AI systems for clients in defence and other industries, with 2,000+ engineers, data scientists and AI specialists in 20+ countries.
“The military don’t buy AI, they buy a result in the field. Investors look at the same thing,” says @KrasovskyValery, CEO of Sigma Software Group, who will be personally involved in the track.
👉 Apply by 30 October: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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What a defence-tech team should check before it starts developing a product: an op-ed by Yana Shkvarovska, Director of the Defence Builder Accelerator, for @lb_ua.
These checks are how we work with accelerator teams. In Batch 4.0, participants test with active military units, document results for procurement and investors, and work with 30+ mentors with defence and venture backgrounds.
Read the op-ed: lb.ua/tech/2026/10/22/775028…
Apply for Batch 4.0: defencebuilder.com/accelerat…
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🇺🇸🇺🇦Daria Yaniieva, President of Defence Builder, spoke at “Dispatch from Kyiv” by @USUBC and @BENS_org in Washington during AUSA week.
Her main point: copying a Ukrainian drone as is won’t get far in the U.S. American forces buy capability that fits their doctrine, so Ukrainian teams have to adapt.
One of the fastest ways is a U.S. partner who already has access to procurement.
DIU sessions are part of DB Accelerator Batch 4.0.
👉Apply by 30 October: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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🔥A Batch 3.0 team, Fremen, raised its anti-EW drone technology from TRL 2 to TRL 6 and received letters of intent from Ukrainian brigades within months of joining DB Accelerator. Here is why it matters if you're applying for Batch 4.0!
Fremen builds a survival system for drones under electronic warfare: it detects RF threats, helps the drone evade them and jams them. The team joined with strong engineering expertise and an early proof of concept, and needed support with R&D, testing, integrations and business development.
During the programme:
🔹 The team received R&D equipment and access to drone testing ranges
🔹 The Defence Builder Military Liaison team gave Fremen technical guidance
🔹 We introduced the team to defence manufacturers and military end users
Results:
✅ technology maturity raised from TRL 2 to TRL 6
✅ LOIs from Ukrainian brigades
✅ cooperation with the Odesa Military Academy
✅ technical integration opportunities with defence manufacturers
👉 Apply: lnkd.in/duCenp_c
👉Details: lnkd.in/dQScvH4g
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In London, the Defence Builder delegation met @BAESystemsplc. Nine Ukrainian defence-tech companies discussed advancement in their technologies. Greater cooperation between Ukraine and the UK. At the table: Sine Engineering, Farsight Vision, Meta Bureau, Trinity Robotics, Oko Camera, MaXon Systems, and Moodro, all with products in operational use.
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🔥AEQUO Law Firm is the legal partner of DB Accelerator Batch 4.0!
One of Ukraine's leading law firms, becomes Batch 4.0 official legal partner. Over the four months of the programme, Aequo's lawyers will build its legal part for selected teams on corporate, IP and contract questions.
Most defence-tech founders leave the legal side for later. Then an investor asks who owns the code and how the equity is split, or a contract arrives with terms nobody has checked. Fixing this at that point takes months and can cost you the deal.
In Batch 4.0, you will sort it out while there is still time. With Aequo, you will:
🔹set up your company the way investors expect to see it
🔹make sure your company fully owns the product and the IP
🔹agree on equity split between founders & investors
🔹understand export rules before you sign with foreign partners
🔹know which invest terms to negotiate before you sign
Aequo has been named Law Firm of the Year: Ukraine by The Lawyer European Awards two years in a row. The firm advised Ukrainian Defence Industry on its joint venture with Rheinmetall, and it runs Startup Desk, a practice for tech and defence-tech teams.
👉Applications for Batch 4.0 are open until 30 October: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
👉Programme details: defencebuilder.com/batch4
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🇺🇦 A Batch 3.0 team closed its first government contract and raised $370K in bridge financing within months of joining Defence Builder Accelerator. Here’s what happened — and why it matters if you’re applying for Batch 4.0 by 30 October. 🧵
Apply: defencebuilder.com/batch4-ap…
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WingTech builds a reusable fixed-wing UAV. The product was at TRL 9, but sales were limited to small quarterly volumes. During the programme, the team demoed to procurement officers from the 3rd, 10th and 16th Army Corps, adjusted the product after military feedback, and got introduced to a component supplier.
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Results:
✅ first government contract
✅ $370K in bridge financing
✅ a component supply partnership
✅ critical enterprise status within Ukraine’s defence industrial base
Batch 4.0 gives you demos to commanders and procurement officers from 30+ military units, a Field Demo Day with 80+ military, a production plan built with manufacturers, and 100+ investors once your evidence is ready.
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🎙 At Flaming Shield '26 in Kaunas, Vladyslav Berehovyi, Head of Program at DB Accelerator, delivered the keynote "Battle-Tested Is Not a Badge"
Key points👇
📌Validation has an expiry date: the adversary needs less than three months to counter a new system on the front.
📌The commander is the first customer: units bought 70% of the UGV platforms in use themselves, and state procurement covered at most 30%.
📌Each validator gives something different: the state gives the right to be bought, testing platforms give access to ranges and units, buyers give orders, and combat units show how the product actually performs.
📌IP needs attention before the test: under Law 4585-IX, economic rights to what servicemembers create on duty belong to the state.
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🇱🇹 Defence Builder and Tech-Park Kaunas signed a memorandum of cooperation at the opening of Flaming Shield '26. It covers knowledge sharing, joint work with Ukrainian and Lithuanian defence tech teams, product integrations and joint events.
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Defence Builder and the Defense Innovation Unit (DIU) of the U.S. Department of War will hold an online workshop for Ukrainian defence tech companies.
📅Monday, 19 October, 19:00 Kyiv time.
👉Registration: luma.com/gah12kyk
Registration is mandatory, and the number of places is limited.
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Defence Builder works with 30+ Ukrainian defence tech companies through its accelerator and fund. We organised this workshop with DIU so that Ukrainian teams preparing for the U.S. market can hear the Department of War's expectations directly, before they plan their entry.
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