Orbit to Operations: Bridging Government and Industry in Defense Innovation | The Pair Program Ep71
The Pair Program · 2025-09-02 · 47 min
Episode notes
Orbit to Operations: Bridging Government and Industry in Defense Innovation | The Pair Program Ep71 On this week’s Pair Program, hosts Tim Winkler and Mike Gruen sit down with Topher Haddad, Co-founder/CEO of Albedo, and Arthur Grijalva, Director of SpaceWERX. They discuss how startups and the U.S. Space Force are working together to advance space innovation, touching on Albedo’s Clarity-1 satellite launch and the role of SpaceWERX’s STRATFI program in bridging commercial and defense priorities. Key topics covered: How the STRATFI program accelerates dual-use innovation Albedo’s Clarity-1 launch and VLEO breakthroughs Challenges of securing government funding and partnerships The role of commercial viability in defense innovation Advice for founders entering the defense-tech ecosystem About Topher Haddad: Topher is the Co-founder/CEO of Albedo, a company pioneering very low Earth orbit (VLEO) satellites. Albedo’s first satellite, Clarity-1, demonstrates imagery resolution once reserved for aircraft or billion-dollar government systems. Previously, Topher was an engineer at Lockheed Martin working on national security space programs. About Arthur F.