Drumbeat Capital Research
Overview
Drumbeat Capital is a seed-stage deep tech venture firm founded in 2025 and based in San Francisco, with a second office in Munich, Germany. It has two Founding Partners, Steven Jacobs and Lukas Leitner, both formerly of Lakestar, the European VC firm. The firm describes itself as a transatlantic bridge for deep tech: it connects European founders with later-stage capital and customers in the US, and connects American founders with the technical talent, industrial base and governments of Europe. Its tagline is "Commercializing Scientific Breakthroughs", and its stated belief is that the next trillion-dollar companies will be born from commercializing scientific breakthroughs.
Investment Thesis
The firm argues that the global economy is moving from a unipolar to a multipolar order, and that technological sovereignty, industrial resilience, energy security and supply chain control have become strategic priorities for governments and corporations. It expects this to drive a once-in-a-generation flow of capital into deep technologies and physical infrastructure. Drumbeat authored The 2026 Deep Tech Report (June 2026, over 400 pages), which analyzes the US and European deep tech ecosystems and is its main public thought-leadership asset. The report, and coverage of it, states that deep tech now accounts for roughly half of US venture funding and about a third of European funding.
Sector Focus
The website lists four areas: Aerospace and Dual Use (space infrastructure as the next frontier of global power); Novel AI and Compute (the infrastructure and models that come after LLMs); Robotics and Manufacturing (cost-effective, resilient supply chains despite a labor shortage); and Energy and Materials (sustainable energy and advanced materials). Public posts by the partners also reference fusion, chips, and defense and sovereignty technology. Hardware and capital-intensive bets are an explicit focus, and Steven Jacobs has said the firm understands the need to de-risk such bets and wants to build new structures and partnerships for them.
Stage Focus and Check Size
Drumbeat invests at seed stage in the US and Europe. PitchBook describes it as preferring seed-stage deep tech companies in both regions. The firm does not publish check sizes, and none could be verified, so check size fields are left empty. The report shows a particular interest in the seed-to-Series A transition, comparing graduation rates for US deep tech, European deep tech and regular tech.
Fund Status and Recent Activity
Drumbeat launched its debut fund targeting up to $50 million, according to an SEC filing reported by AltAssets (July 7, 2026) and Axios Pro (July 11, 2026). The fund is in market, and PitchBook shows the firm as actively seeking investments with zero recorded investments. No portfolio companies are listed on the firm's website, and no investment announcements could be found. This profile therefore carries no portfolio companies; none were inferred.
The firm is highly active as a convener. It hosted The Global State of Deep Tech at Deep Tech Week SF 2026, hosted a Transatlantic Deep Tech Briefing with Dealroom, and Steven Jacobs spoke on tech sovereignty at an October 2026 event with the Danish Ambassador and the American-Danish Business Council.
Team
Steven Jacobs, Founding Partner, was a Partner at Lakestar (about $2B AUM) where he led the deep tech practice and supported Isar Aerospace and Proxima Fusion. He is the founder and former CEO of Olio Devices, which Flex acquired in 2017, and has worked at Apple, Google and Meta. Lukas Leitner, Founding Partner, is also a former Lakestar investor and moderates the firm's robotics and manufacturing panels; no further biography could be verified.
Decision Process and Lead Tendency
With two founding partners the process is presumably a small partnership, but this is not stated anywhere public. Lead tendency is unknown given no recorded deals.
Founder Preferences
The firm wants technical founders commercializing scientific breakthroughs, and particularly European founders who want US customers and capital, or US founders who want European talent, industrial partners and government support. A Transatlantic angle strengthens fit.
Geographic Focus
The US (San Francisco Bay Area) and Europe (Germany and wider Europe).
Gaps
Check size, lead tendency, decision timeline, portfolio and AUM are unverified. Dealroom and Techleap profiles were blocked by Cloudflare, and LinkedIn profiles were sign-in gated.