Stanislaw Kastory and Mikolaj Firlej, Co-founders and General Partners at Expeditions: Backing Europe's defence startups with €197m fund

Expeditions is one of Europe's only venture funds dedicated to defence and security startups. The firm recently closed its second fund at €197m.

Stanislaw Kastory and Mikolaj Firlej are Co-founders and General Partners at Expeditions. The firm backs early-stage teams across defence, cybersecurity, quantum and space technology. The new fund plans to make around 40 early-stage investments, with half its capital reserved for follow-on rounds.

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Sponsors:

Chargebee: ⁠https://www.chargebee.com/events/beelieve/london/2026⁠

SurrealDB: ⁠https://surrealdb.com/⁠

Airwallex: ⁠https://www.airwallex.com/uk?utm_source=other&utm_medium=partner_referral&utm_campaign=v01_emea_multi_ib_dg_prtmk_mofu_scalingeurope⁠

Lovable: ⁠https://lovable.dev/⁠

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction

0:08 - Expeditions closes its €197m second fund

1:04 - How raising fund two differed from fund one

4:23 - Fund one's early bets in defence tech

7:10 - What's different about fund two's strategy

9:40 - Where Europe's biggest defence gaps are

12:36 - How Expeditions finds and evaluates startups

16:20 - Do European countries compete for their own defence champions?

19:52 - Financing war vs. financing European defence