Countdown Capital

Jai Malik, the founder and managing partner, leads all investment decisions. Before founding Countdown in 2021, Malik invested in defense and industrial technology at Marque Ventures, where his portfolio included Anduril. The firm does not publicly list other investment partners, operating as a concentrated vehicle under Malik's direction.

Countdown Capital raises intentionally small funds: its second fund, closed in November 2023, reached only $15 million. The firm caps fund size to maintain a concentrated portfolio of roughly 15 companies, enabling high conviction and deep technical engagement with each founding team. This departs from the venture-industry norm of scaling fund size with each subsequent vehicle.

Countdown Capital operates as a sector-focused venture capital firm, not a family office. It raises capital from institutional limited partners and external family offices and is structured as a traditional venture partnership rather than a proprietary capital vehicle.

Countdown writes first checks into companies building industrials, defense technology, autonomous systems, space manufacturing, and advanced robotics. The firm favors businesses with technical risk profiles and long-term government procurement potential, explicitly avoiding sectors outside deep tech and national-security applications.

Countdown regularly syndicates with defense-technology specialists like Shield Capital and the American Dynamism team at Andreessen Horowitz. The firm co-leads or leads pre-seed and seed rounds, and its partners actively coordinate with other venture investors that hold the security clearances or domain expertise necessary for dual-use company building.