Marcus Erken

Happy & curious. Founding Partner @sunfishpartners, an early stage VC investing in space & defense startups from Eastern Europe.

[Marcus Erken @marcuserken]

EWOR’s Global Top 100 Founder Mentors -> Very happy to be recognized among so many talented individuals. Thank you, @EWOR_official!

Working with hundreds of founders over the years has been one hell of a ride. No end in sight :)

You can find the full list of mentors here: https://t.co/tW4bqxdgvG

[Gad Saad @GadSaad]

It's been #1 across all books, #1 in Politics, #1 in Psychology, #1 in Western History, etc. It's only day #6 of its release! Let's inoculate the West against Civilizational Seppuku!

[Jakub Stojek @JakubStojek]

SpaceX showed a satellite 170 meters long this week. Starship is 124.

The "AI Sat Mini" is bigger than the rocket designed to launch it.

Many say orbital data centers are too ambitious. The economics are brutal, the engineering unsolved, the timeline a fantasy.

They're not wrong about the constraint. They're wrong about the conclusion. A 1 GW orbital compute cluster needs roughly 4 km² of solar collection area. SpaceX's answer for now: 10,000 individual 100 kW satellites, each one fitting inside a fairing. Smart workaround but still a workaround.

Musk himself closed his presentation with a video of future satellites being built on the Moon and launched by mass driver. He knows the current architecture has a ceiling.

With in-orbit manufacturing, that ceiling disappears. You're no longer limited by what fits inside a rocket. You build where you operate. That's what we're working on at @_OrbitalMatter

At that point, 1 GW isn't ambitious. It's just the starting point.
#spacedatacenters #inorbitmanufacturing #spaceinfrastructure #spacetech #AIinfrastructure

Source: @SpaceNews_Inc

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

Accurate

[Sunfish Partners @sunfishpartners]

https://t.co/oGzOfLVZUo

[Sunfish Partners @sunfishpartners]

Executive summary:

Davin Michaelis spent 25 years in special operations prior to joining us as a venture partner. In this piece, he urges Defense Tech companies to move beyond building in isolation and focus on real-world impact.

He believes true value is proven at the modern “decisive point” of conflict, specifically Ukraine, where technology directly shapes battlefield outcomes.

[Naval @naval]

If you do not direct your attention, it will be directed for you.

[Alice Smith @TheAliceSmith]

We desperately need to stop asking, “Is it offensive?” and start asking instead, “Is it true?”

[Konstantin Kisin @KonstantinKisin]

Marco Rubio's Munich Speech was word perfect. The Americans couldn't be clearer: they love Europe and Britain, they see themselves as the keepers of the flame of Western civilisation and they want us to pull our weight.

I just hope our leaders listen.

[George Mack @george__mack]

The single biggest thing the most successful people I've met have in common is that they have nothing in common. They rejected "the way" and did it their own way. Rather than fit into some pre-defined hole in the wall, they drilled a me shaped hole in the wall.

[Hans-Georg Maaßen @HGMaassen]

„Lassen Sie uns die Dinge beim Namen nennen: Verfassungsschutz und Polizei sind im Bereich Linksextremismus seit Jahren nicht etwa machtlos – sie sind bewusst blind. Die zahlreichen Brandanschläge der Vulkangruppen, die seit über einem Jahrzehnt kritische Infrastruktur attackieren, ohne dass die Täter gefasst werden, sind der beste Beweis dafür. Genauso wie bei anderen linksextremen Aktionen aus dem Antifa-Milieu: Wenn der politische Wille da wäre, könnten die Behörden diese Netzwerke innerhalb einiger Monate zerschlagen. Stattdessen bleibt es bei lauwarmen Beobachtungen und politischer Schönfärberei.

Islamistische Anschläge hingegen werden oft nur durch Hinweise ausländischer Nachrichtendienste verhindert – vielfach nicht deshalb, weil uns die Mittel fehlen, sondern weil der Fokus politisch-ideologisch verzerrt ist. Die politische Ansage ist: „Kampf gegen Rechts“. Dem ist alles unterzuordnen. Das eigentliche Problem ist nicht ein Mangel an Befugnissen, sondern ein Mangel an Willen, linke Gewalt als das zu behandeln, was sie ist: Terrorismus.

Der Verfassungsschutz wird seit Jahren in seinem „Kampf gegen Rechts“ und Deligitimierer und Verächtlichmacher gegen politische Gegner missbraucht – gegen Bürger, die die Regierung und die etablierten Parteien kritisieren. Er observiert und diffamiert Menschen, wie mich, die nichts anderes tun, als ihr Grundrecht auf freie Meinungsäußerung wahrzunehmen. In seiner jetzigen Form schützt er die Verfassung nicht – er gefährdet sie aktiv.

Und genau dieses Versagen wird nun wieder zum Vorwand genommen, um noch mehr Macht zu fordern. Dobrindts Plan, dem Verfassungsschutz polizeiliche und operative Befugnisse zu geben – also ihn zu einer Art Geheimpolizei zu machen –, ist brandgefährlich. Das widerspricht fundamental dem Trennungsgebot, das wir nach den Erfahrungen mit Gestapo und Stasi bewusst in unsere Verfassungsordnung eingebaut haben. Wir wollten nie wieder eine politische Geheimpolizei, die unkontrolliert zuschlägt.

Statt neuer Befugnisse brauchen wir das Gegenteil: eine Entpolitisierung des Verfassungsschutzes, eine echte Neutralität und eine klare Priorisierung echter Verfassungsfeinde – egal ob links, islamistisch oder sonst wie. Alles andere führt uns in einen Überwachungsstaat, in dem Kritik am System zum Staatsverbrechen wird. Das darf nicht passieren!“

Hans-Georg Maaßen aktuell bei @AlexWallasch
TM

[Jakub Stojek @JakubStojek]

Space data centers will happen - but only if we build what Earth cannot

AI’s growth is now hitting the physical limits of Earth. OpenAI’s internal target of 250 GW by 2033 exceeds the electricity consumption of entire nations. And if that’s the trajectory, the real question becomes: Where do we put the next 250 GW of AI?

Space suddenly looks like the only environment that truly scales: continuous solar power, a perfect radiative sink, and infinite real estate.

But here’s the catch: multi-megawatt compute in orbit needs massive solar arrays and thousands of square meters of radiators. These aren’t “deployables” anymore. They’re industrial-scale structures far too large to launch, even on Starship.

Which means the only viable path forward is clear: Build the infrastructure in orbit, not on Earth.

This is why @_OrbitalMatter exists. We manufacture these systems directly in space - 100+ meter booms, solar backbones, and radiator structures that never have to fit inside a rocket fairing.

And this isn’t theoretical. It is the foundation of our technology roadmap: Printed booms → full deployable structures → 100m+ arrays and radiators → orbital infrastructure layer enabling space data centers.

@OpenAI @SpaceX
#SpaceDataCenters #InOrbitComputing #SpaceTech #SpaceInnovation

[Marcus Erken @marcuserken]

--> @NATO DIANA accelerates dual-use startups for the Alliance. I’ve joined as a mentor.

Last week was our cohort kick-off in Riga. I especially enjoyed the exchange with the many active military personnel who participated.

With an acceptance rate below 5%, getting into this program was highly selective for the startups.

[Marcus Erken @marcuserken]

Vallendar. A great start to this year’s New Venture Creation at WHU!

Over the coming weeks, students will work hands-on on their ventures. If past cohorts are any indication, many will continue beyond the course and become successful entrepreneurs.

What makes this course special is the depth of support: personal coaching sessions with entrepreneurs, angels, and VCs.

It’s incredible to see how many people contribute each year to help nurture the next generation of entrepreneurs. Thank you!

[Curiosity @CuriosityonX]

🚨: The observable universe is more than 93 billion light-years wide… yet humans have only traveled 1.3 light-seconds away from Earth.

[Naval @naval]

Choose inspiration over envy.

[ZUBY: @ZubyMusic]

The West is suffering because people are pretending that obviously true things are not obvious and true.

Common sense and objective facts were sacrificed for politically correct fluff and emotionality, and now the populations are bearing the consequences.

[Black Hole @konstructivizm]

3.2 trillion pixel camera! The telescope behind it is the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile, equipped with the world’s biggest digital astronomy camera — a 3.2-gigapixel monster known as the LSST Camera.

What you’re seeing isn’t just a still photo — it’s the start of a 10-year, ultra-wide, ultra-high-definition time-lapse movie of the universe.

Every few nights, Rubin will re-image the sky, capturing galaxies, nebulae, stars, asteroids — and anything that moves or changes.

[Atlas Press @realAtlasPress]

Carl Sagan explains how the Ancient Greeks knew the earth was round over 2,000 years ago

[Prof. Feynman @ProfFeynman]

Be humble. Be teachable. The universe is bigger than your view of the universe. There's always room for a new idea.