The CIA is a Water Investor

Transcript

The CIA is a water techch investor and wait it gets weirder. In 1999, the CIA launched a nonprofit venture capital arm called INQEL or IQT. The idea was that the private sector was rapidly outpacing the government's technological capacity. So, they'd rather buy a first row seat to identify, evaluate, and leverage those emerging commercial technologies. Interestingly, this means IQT is an investor that's not measured by financial return metrics, but by technology adoption.

Probably the only one that's like that. And they have money. They of course receive classified funding, but probably around $50 million a year and are set to have a bit over $1 billion of assets under management. They've used that budget to invest in over 750 companies so far. The most famous being keyhole that you maybe know today as Google Earth, but also Penaltier or nerds like me will know this one, MongoDB.

Interestingly, they invested in one water tech company, Constellar, that uses micro satellites to monitor the Earth's surface temperature and chemical composition to derive water needs and availability, hence selling to agricultural companies, governments, and infrastructure operators. But the weird part is that Constellar is a spinout of the Fronhoffer Institute and is hence European. The US foreign intelligence service invests abroad somewhat logical but also has offices in London, Sydney, Singapore and Munich. So the next time you pitch, think to yourself, is that investor genuinely curious or is he a secret agent?