The first puppy hasn't been born. The company is already valued at $1.2 billion. Warhound, a Texas startup, wants to clone the best military dogs and edit out their bad genes. The Journal's Marcus Weisgerber and Heather Somerville reported it Monday. By Wednesday the same circle of founders had a second headline. The drone maker Anduril will build laptops.
Two founders dreamed it up. Palmer Luckey co-founded the defense firm Anduril. Ben Lamm co-founded Colossal Biosciences, the company trying to bring back the woolly mammoth and the dodo. Warhound raised $200 million in its first round. The investors include In-Q-Tel, the venture firm linked to the CIA, and Sequoia Capital. Sequoia's Shaun Maguire, who is leading the deal, also advises the Pentagon. PitchBook, a research firm, puts the value at $1.2 billion.
Here's the plan, told plainly. Collect cells from top military and police dogs. Freeze them. Clone the dogs. Then remove gene variants tied to disease, like the ones linked to hip dysplasia. Later, engineer a keener nose, more speed and agility. The first breeds are Belgian Malinois and German shepherds, with Labradors to come. The first puppies are due in the first quarter of 2027. Anduril has no stake and Luckey isn't on the board, though Anduril will make the dogs' eye and ear protection and body armor. Some scientists have panned Colossal's past claims and warn that heavily edited animals can upset ecosystems. The Air Force, which trains the Pentagon's dogs, declined to comment.
There's a real need under the hype. Nearly 90% of the military's working dogs are bought overseas. The Pentagon has more than 2,200 dog teams at 182 locations. CEO David Spirk calls the dogs a living supply chain that has to come home.
And then, laptops
Anduril is known for pilotless fighter jets and robot submarines. On Monday it said it will also build a laptop called BlueChip with Qualcomm (QCOM). The machines are built to take a beating and a dunking, for troops, police, government workers and first responders. Anduril will build them at its Arsenal-1 plant near Columbus, Ohio. The chips come from Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) at its Arizona plant, Qualcomm's CEO said. Luckey says 90% of the materials come from the U.S. and allies. The display panel isn't made in America yet, and Anduril is working on that. “Nobody can use it as leverage against you,” Luckey said of owning the supply chain. Anduril itself is valued at $90 billion.
Our read
This is about risk (Investments/Risk · IN04). A $1.2 billion valuation on a company with no puppies is a price on a promise. That's what early private money does. It prices hope, and sometimes hope pays. The investors here can afford to be wrong. They spread bets across dozens of companies. A retiree who gets pitched a slice of the next defense unicorn usually can't. The house doesn't own Anduril, Warhound or Colossal. They're private. It does own the chip maker. Taiwan Semiconductor (TSM) is held at weight in 30 books, nothing added, and its Arizona plant is a small, real piece of the onshoring story. The old-line defense names are held at weight too, Lockheed Martin (LMT) in 29 books. Nothing added.
The concrete thing is any private deal, pre-IPO fund or so-called access product sitting in your plan or your inbox. This week, find out two things about it. What it would cost to get out, and how long that would take. If you can't answer either, it's a story, and stories belong in a sleeve you could lose. The umbrella gets bought before the clouds. We'll go through the paperwork with you.