Watchtower Labs raises $35M for military planning AI
Shield Capital and Conviction co-lead Watchtower Labs' $35 million seed round for AI-assisted military planning.
What happened
Watchtower Labs emerged from stealth with $35 million in seed financing led by Shield Capital and Conviction, with participation from Founders Fund. The company is developing AI-native software for military decision support, beginning with logistics planning across transport, fuel, spare parts, munitions, routes and time.
Why it matters
Military logistics involves many connected constraints that can change quickly. Watchtower combines simulation, optimisation and AI to generate and test possible courses of action while showing planners the assumptions and trade-offs behind them. Human decision-makers remain responsible for the resulting operational choices.
The bigger picture
Defence investors continue to back software intended to shorten planning cycles and improve operational awareness. Watchtower has already worked with the Naval Postgraduate School and was selected for a Defense Innovation Unit programme. The practical tests will be deployment reliability, integration with existing systems and whether the software improves decisions under real operational conditions.