Dual-Use Startup Statistics
Dual-use startup statistics for 2026: funding, defence demand, aerospace, cybersecurity, drones, satellites, logistics, procurement risk, and founder opportunities.
TL;DR: As of May 2026, dual-use startup statistics point to a category moving from niche to strategic. Mind the Bridge estimated in 2024 that roughly 15,000 of 60,000 VC-backed scaleups across NATO and allied countries were working on dual-use technologies, while only about 5% had implemented technologies across both civilian and defence sectors. Defence demand has accelerated since then: global military spending reached USD 2.887 trillion in 2025, NATO allies agreed to a 5% GDP defence and security-related spending target by 2035, and Dealroom plus the NATO Innovation Fund reported USD 8.7 billion of 2025 VC funding for European defence, security, and resilience startups. The best bootstrapped openings are cybersecurity, compliance, procurement readiness, drone operations, simulation, manufacturing traceability, logistics resilience, satellite data products, and software that helps commercial technology become trusted enough for public-sector adoption.
Most Citeable Stats
Mind the Bridge estimated in 2024 that about 15,000 of 60,000 VC-backed scaleups across NATO and allied countries were developing dual-use technologies, equal to roughly 25% of the mapped ecosystem, according to Mind the Bridge.
The same 2024 analysis found fewer than 200 pure defense-tech scaleups and about 715 dual-use companies that had extended civilian solutions into defence, with only about 5% of dual-use startups implemented across both civilian and defence sectors, according to Mind the Bridge.
Global military expenditure reached USD 2.887 trillion in 2025, while European military expenditure rose 14% to USD 864 billion, according to SIPRI.
NATO Allies agreed at The Hague Summit in June 2025 to invest 5% of GDP annually by 2035 in core defence requirements plus defence- and security-related spending, according to NATO.
European defence, security, and resilience startups raised USD 8.7 billion in VC in 2025, up 55% year over year, according to Dealroom and the NATO Innovation Fund.
Dealroom and the NATO Innovation Fund reported that European DSR startups raised USD 5.2 billion in 2024, up 24% year over year and nearly 5x over six years, according to the NATO Innovation Fund PDF.
PitchBook data shared by Defense News put broad 2025 defense-tech VC deal value at USD 49.1 billion, using a category that includes dual-use companies, according to Defense News.
Mind the Bridge identified 54 VC funds globally that invest in dual-use startups in 2025, with 48% based in the United States, 11% in the United Kingdom, and another 15% in Ukraine, the Baltics, and Eastern Europe, according to Mind the Bridge.
Key Statistics
Mind the Bridge’s 2024 NATO and allied-country analysis mapped over 60,000 VC-backed scaleups and estimated that around 25% were developing dual-use technologies, according to Mind the Bridge.
Mind the Bridge reported that only about 5% of dual-use startups had implemented technology across both civilian and defence sectors in its 2024 analysis, showing a large conversion gap between theoretical dual-use relevance and actual defence adoption, according to Mind the Bridge.
Mind the Bridge’s 2025 dual-use report identified 54 global VC funds that invest in dual-use startups, and nearly half were based in the United States, according to Mind the Bridge.
AIN Ventures’ 2024 Dual-Use Technology report analyzed 645 dual-use companies that had raised more than USD 5 million of venture capital funding in 2024, according to AIN Ventures.
SIPRI reported global military spending of USD 2.887 trillion in 2025, with Europe up 14% to USD 864 billion, according to SIPRI.
NATO’s 2025 spending commitment splits the 5% GDP target into 3.5% for core defence requirements and 1.5% for defence- and security-related investments such as critical infrastructure, resilience, innovation, and industrial capacity, according to NATO.
Dealroom and the NATO Innovation Fund reported that European DSR startups raised USD 8.7 billion in 2025, representing 13% of all European VC funding and 43% of European deep-tech VC funding, according to the NATO Innovation Fund.
The 2025 Dealroom and NATO Innovation Fund release said AI underpinned 44% of European DSR startup funding in 2025, according to the NATO Innovation Fund.
Dealroom and the NATO Innovation Fund’s 2025 PDF reported that European DSR represented an all-time high 10% of all European VC funding in 2024 and about one-third of all European deep-tech funding, according to the NATO Innovation Fund PDF.
PitchBook data reported by Defense News put 2025 defense-tech VC deal value at USD 49.1 billion, up from USD 27.2 billion in 2024, with dual-use companies included in the broad category, according to Defense News.
Crunchbase put narrower 2025 funding for VC-backed defense startups at USD 7.7 billion across close to 100 deals, defining the category around military, national security, and law enforcement, according to Crunchbase.
Silicon Valley Defense Group’s 2025 NatSec100 identifies the top 100 venture-backed, dual-use and defense technology companies across AI, autonomy, advanced computing, space, cyber, and resilient infrastructure, according to SVDG.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office reported in February 2025 that the Defense Innovation Unit made 450 prototype awards from fiscal years 2016 through 2023 and that 51% of completed prototypes transitioned to production, according to GAO.
The Defense Innovation Unit’s FY23 report said DIU prototype companies had attracted more than USD 68 billion of private investment and yielded 62 commercial solution transitions through fiscal year 2023, according to DIU.
The European Investment Fund and European Commission launched the Defence Equity Facility with EUR 175 million in 2024, combining EUR 100 million from the European Defence Fund and EUR 75 million from EIF to support defense innovation and dual-use technology, according to the European Investment Fund.
EUDIS says the EU Defence Innovation Scheme is enabled by the European Defence Fund and supports SMEs, startups, and other non-traditional defence players with access to EDF opportunities, according to EUDIS.
The EUDIS Business Accelerator says it will support 40 startups and scaleups across two cohorts in 2026, with 20 companies in spring and 20 in autumn, according to EUDIS.
BryceTech lists Start-Up Space 2026 as an April 2026 report, making space startup financing one of the latest public datasets to watch for satellite, launch, and space-data dual-use companies, according to BryceTech.
Dual-Use Startup Funding Snapshot
Dual-use funding is easier to understand when the data is separated by definition. A broad defense-tech dataset can include civilian-first companies with military applications. A DSR dataset can include resilience, critical infrastructure, energy, and security. A narrow defense dataset may count only military, national-security, and law-enforcement companies.
This is why the same startup can look huge in one dataset and invisible in another. A satellite analytics company, a cyber compliance platform, a drone autonomy startup, and a logistics resilience tool can all be dual-use. Their buyer path, funding needs, risk, and revenue timing are completely different.
For companion context, Mean CEO’s defense tech startup funding statistics explain the broader defence funding boom, while the drone startup statistics by industry page breaks down one of the clearest dual-use categories.
What Counts As A Dual-Use Startup
A dual-use startup builds technology that can create value for both civilian and government, defence, public safety, intelligence, critical infrastructure, or national-security buyers.
Common categories include:
- Aerospace and autonomous systems.
- Cybersecurity and secure software.
- Drones, counter-drone systems, and drone operations.
- Satellites, space data, communications, and earth observation.
- Logistics, supply-chain resilience, and emergency response.
- AI, autonomy, sensing, robotics, simulation, and advanced computing.
- Manufacturing, traceability, industrial base software, and materials.
- Energy resilience, grid security, microgrids, batteries, nuclear, and fusion.
- Medical readiness, biosecurity, and emergency health logistics.
The category sounds attractive because it appears to offer two markets. The hard part is that each market has different buying behavior. A commercial buyer may care about ROI, speed, liability, reliability, and integration. A defence buyer may care about mission fit, security, interoperability, procurement rules, export controls, survivability, and political risk.
That split creates a strategic choice. A founder can start commercial-first, defence-first, or dual-track from the beginning. For bootstrapped founders, commercial-first with defence-grade discipline is usually the least fragile route.
Dual-Use Startup Categories With Buyer Paths
The most founder-friendly dual-use wedges usually sit around adoption, evidence, compliance, and operations. These are less glamorous than aircraft, ships, satellites, or weapons, but they can create revenue before a giant round.
Europe And The United States Are Playing Different Dual-Use Games
The United States still has the deepest national-security startup capital stack, the largest defence budget, and the strongest cluster of specialist investors, accelerators, and government innovation pathways. The 2025 NatSec100 is a useful marker because it ranks venture-backed U.S. companies across AI, autonomy, advanced computing, space, cyber, and resilient infrastructure.
Europe’s story is different. Europe has urgent defence demand, deep tech talent, public funding, and a growing DSR category, but the market is fragmented by country, buyer type, procurement culture, and policy. Dealroom and the NATO Innovation Fund’s 2025 DSR data shows that Europe is moving quickly, but speed is still the founder constraint.
For European founders, the practical move is to avoid getting trapped inside grant theatre. Public money can buy technical runway, customer access, and credibility. It can also turn a startup into a reporting machine. Use public funding to reach field proof, commercial proof, or production proof. Keep the buyer at the center.
The Procurement Gap Is The Startup Risk
Dual-use startups can raise money on a defence narrative, but revenue still depends on buyers who can procure, deploy, integrate, and renew.
GAO’s February 2025 DIU review is useful because it separates prototype access from production transition. DIU made 450 prototype awards from fiscal years 2016 through 2023 and reported a 51% transition rate for completed prototypes. That is meaningful progress. It also shows why a founder should plan beyond pilots.
This is where small founders can build useful companies. Procurement intelligence, compliance evidence, security documentation, export-control workflow, manufacturing readiness, field-test records, grant reporting, training, simulation, and buyer education all sit close to dual-use adoption.
MeanCEO Index: Dual-Use Founder Opportunities
The MeanCEO Index scores practical bootstrapped founder opportunity from 1 to 10. The criteria are buyer access, paid proof speed, capital intensity, procurement friction, compliance burden, margin potential, dual-use flexibility, and whether a small team can create value before a large funding round.
The highest-scoring opportunities are the connective tissue around adoption. Help buyers evaluate, trust, buy, deploy, secure, train, maintain, and document technology. That is where a small team can start.
What The Numbers Mean For Bootstrapped Founders
Dual-use is attractive because it can give a startup more than one buyer path. It is dangerous because founders can use the second buyer path as an excuse for weak focus.
Use this filter before building:
- Pick one primary buyer for the first 90 days.
- Decide whether the company is commercial-first, defence-first, or dual-track.
- Name the proof that buyer will pay for: uptime, security evidence, response time, lower risk, faster inspection, better routing, fewer defects, or deployment readiness.
- Map the procurement route before you design a government sales story.
- Identify security, data-handling, export-control, certification, and compliance requirements early.
- Use commercial revenue to create leverage where possible.
- Treat a grant or pilot as a milestone that must lead to revenue.
- Avoid full-stack hardware unless the team has capital, production depth, and a buyer who understands the timeline.
For female founders and first-time founders, dual-use can look like a closed room full of defence language, insiders, ex-military networks, and hardware bravado. Some of that is real. It should still not push practical founders away from cyber, workflow, compliance, training, simulation, documentation, procurement, AI governance, data quality, manufacturing software, or resilience tools.
For European founders, dual-use is especially relevant because Europe has deep tech talent, public funding, industrial buyers, and urgent security needs. The trap is procedure. A founder can spend months chasing eligibility while the product stays unfunded by customers. Use public funding when it reduces technical risk or opens doors. Keep paid proof at the center.
Mean CEO Take
I like dual-use startups when the founder can name the first paying customer without waving a flag.
Defence demand is serious. Europe cannot keep outsourcing hard technology and then act surprised when procurement is slow, fragmented, and dependent. The U.S. has more mature defense-tech capital, but even there, private investment can move faster than public adoption.
For bootstrappers, the smartest dual-use path is usually practical and slightly boring. Sell cyber evidence. Sell manufacturing traceability. Sell readiness. Sell compliance. Sell training. Sell logistics resilience. Sell drone operations. Sell the layer that helps a serious buyer trust a new technology.
The expensive mistake is building a company that needs a giant defence contract before anyone gets value. That keeps the business dependent on financing before customers have proof.
Win ten commercial customers in a regulated sector, then move toward defence-grade requirements with evidence in hand. Grants, accelerators, pilots, and innovation programmes can help when they accelerate proof.
Female founders should pay attention here. Dual-use markets need operators who understand systems, risk, documentation, customers, education, procurement, and disciplined execution. That work is often described as support work until the product fails without it. Then everyone discovers it was the business.
Methodology
This article uses research-task.md as the only article queue and internal URL source. The selected row was Dual-Use Startup Statistics, with the live URL https://blog.mean.ceo/dual-use-startup-statistics/, slug dual-use-startup-statistics, Markdown path research/dual-use-startup-statistics.md, HTML path research/dual-use-startup-statistics.html, and context: “Compare startups selling to both governments and commercial buyers, including aerospace, cybersecurity, drones, satellites, and logistics.”
The source mix prioritizes public spending data, NATO and EU policy sources, venture-backed dual-use mappings, defence and DSR startup funding reports, government innovation data, accelerator information, and sector-specific evidence. It includes SIPRI, NATO, the NATO Innovation Fund, Dealroom, Mind the Bridge, AIN Ventures, Defense News, PitchBook data as reported by Defense News, Crunchbase, SVDG, GAO, DIU, the European Investment Fund, EUDIS, and BryceTech.
The main caveat is definition. Dual-use can mean civilian technology with military relevance, commercial technology already sold to defence buyers, defence-first technology with commercial markets, or broader defence, security, and resilience technology. These categories should not be merged into one market size.
Funding announcements may include equity, debt, secondary components, tender offers, or category assignments that differ by provider. Public spending commitments are demand signals, not startup revenue. Procurement timelines, security requirements, export controls, certification, testing, and production capacity can change founder economics materially.
The data is current as of May 4, 2026. Internal Mean CEO links are taken only from live URLs listed in research-task.md, including defense tech startup funding statistics and drone startup statistics by industry.
Definitions
FAQ
What is a dual-use startup?
A dual-use startup builds technology that can serve both civilian and defence, national-security, public-safety, emergency, intelligence, or resilience buyers. Examples include cybersecurity software, drones, satellite analytics, logistics resilience tools, AI evaluation systems, autonomous systems, and manufacturing traceability software.
How many dual-use startups are there?
There is no single official count. Mind the Bridge estimated in 2024 that about 15,000 of 60,000 VC-backed scaleups across NATO and allied countries were developing dual-use technologies, equal to roughly 25% of the mapped ecosystem.
How much funding do dual-use startups receive?
Funding depends heavily on definition. Dealroom and the NATO Innovation Fund reported USD 8.7 billion of 2025 VC funding for European defence, security, and resilience startups. Defense News reported PitchBook data showing USD 49.1 billion of broad 2025 defense-tech VC deal value, including dual-use companies. Crunchbase’s narrower defense startup category reached USD 7.7 billion in 2025.
What dual-use startup categories are best for bootstrapped founders?
The strongest bootstrapped categories are usually cybersecurity, compliance evidence, procurement readiness, drone operations, logistics resilience, manufacturing traceability, training, simulation, AI governance, data quality, and satellite data products. These can start with narrower buyer pain before requiring large defence contracts.
Why are dual-use startup statistics hard to compare?
Dual-use statistics are hard to compare because providers define the category differently. Some include civilian-first startups with defence relevance, some include companies already selling into defence, some include resilience and critical infrastructure, and some count only military or national-security companies.
Are dual-use startups good for European founders?
Yes, dual-use can be a strong opportunity for European founders when the company has buyer focus, technical proof, and a route through procurement. Europe has rising defence demand, public funding, industrial buyers, and deep tech talent. The main risks are fragmented procurement, long timelines, grant dependency, and slow customer validation.
Should a dual-use startup raise venture capital?
Some dual-use startups need venture capital, especially hardware, autonomy, aerospace, satellite, manufacturing, and deep-tech companies. Software, compliance, procurement, training, analytics, and services-led dual-use companies may be able to reach paid proof with less capital. The funding choice should follow the buyer path and capital intensity.
