Out on a frozen lake in Canada, an upside-down cell tower is collecting data on the local fish population. The device is called Echo, and it’s just the beginning of what Dominion Dynamics hopes to build for the country’s growing defense industry. (Video episode here on YouTube - piped.video/watch?v=e9eORCxS…) Our northern brothers have been agitated to the point of action, thanks to President Trump declaring that they’re nasty people we should perhaps conquer. Threatening Canada is not unlike kicking a puppy, but it turned out to be the final straw. The country counted its beans and concluded the situation was loony — 70 cents of every dollar Canada spends on military hardware goes to American companies. Realizations like these pushed Dominion founder Eliot Pence to move back home after 20 years in the States and get to work on renewing Canada’s awesomeness. “I want to compete with Lockheed, with Anduril, with Northrop,” Pence told me. “I want to put Canada and Canadian defense back on the global map. That’s the ambition, and we can do it.” Before Dominion, Pence spent four years at Anduril as one of its earliest business hires. The lessons he gleaned from that experience are what he hopes to return to Canada, which has a maddening history of building world-class defense technology and immediately tossing it in the trash. “We’re trying to change history here and build back what Canada was,” Pence said. Since its founding in June 2025, Dominion has raised $169M CAD, reportedly at a $570M CAD valuation. They’ve been hard at work on all sorts of cool gadgets like Echo, which is meant to find adversary submarines under the ice, plus a communications network called AuraNe, and an unmanned drone that flies alongside fighter jets called Scout. In the latest episode of our Canada series, we spent some time with Pence to figure out why Canada would even need a robust defense industry. We got a tour of Dominion’s new factory, which will likely never make a camera appearance again because, ya know, top secret defense stuff. We took a skidoo across the lake to see the tech in action and bribe a local fisherman with beer. I almost kiss a pike and jig like my life depends on it. If you aren’t Canada-pilled by the end of this video, perhaps there is no hope left for you.

Don't ask me why I'm watching Nelson's 1990 "After The Rain" video but did The Matrix straight up lift this from, fckin, Nelson?

made @ashleevance do a carbon fiber layup last week! new composite engineer for the company :) it was so fun hosting Ashlee and the entire @corememory team over at our HQ.

So many India episodes coming to the @corememory YouTube channel soon. Come to us, India.

Yes

Thank you @ashleevance for allowing me to indulge in my obsessions on your show: corememory.com/p/anna-gat-si…

Thanks for having me @ashleevance! "Silicon Valley Needs Art" -- The Wordcel Queen Of Silicon Valley — EP 89 Anna Gát @corememory 🎙️ podcasts.apple.com/us/podcas…

Absolutely loved @ashleevance's amazing crew What a fantastic bunch of spirited, fun folks he has assembled. So much to learn from a professional, diligent lot who love their craft & work as a family. Been an eventful 3 days 😍💥💪 And Ashlee who was in the trenches - insane 👑

Had an absolute blast in Darjeeling with @sparshselim

We went to LA to find out if the Gundo has the Chinese work ethic. Join us for this episode of - Liberty Or Subjugation. Full Episode here - corememory.com/p/la-manufact…

>Rainmaker >corvette outside >rock n roll playing in the shop >engineers had no idea who Ashlee Vance was and asked him to leave

and it’s a wrap what a fun time hosting @ashleevance and the @corememory team the himalayas!

Can the US build a DJI? We tore down @DJIGlobal 's 2019 and 2023 Mini drones and priced every part. It's the first public cost breakdown of either. Here's what we learned: DJI earns SaaS-like margins on hardware: ~79% gross margin on a $139 parts BOM. For comparison, Apple makes 53% on the iPhone. We estimate US-sourced parts would cost 2-3x more, cutting margins to 37-58%. The result: US drone makers can't compete in consumer, and focus on premium enterprise and defense. Sovereign silicon: DJI is building its autonomy lead starting at the chip. In 2019, the drone's key chips were American and Dutch. By 2023, all four were DJI's own. Custom silicon jumped from 1% to 26% of the parts bill. Nobody else can buy these chips. One notable exception is the GPS chip, still from Swiss firm @ublox . Chinese alternatives exist, but DJI's flight software is built around u-blox. In modern hardware, lock-in lives in the software. "Cheap China" is an outdated perception. DJI paid more for lighter Chinese batteries, then spent the saved grams on sensors and compute. Their first priority is capability per gram, not cost. Better battery tech → lighter weight → more onboard autonomy. US-made @SkydioHQ has better autonomy, but needs a heavier drone and a $399 chip to get it. We lost the war on cost. The next battlefield is autonomy. DJI's real moat is speed. Shenzhen gets new circuit boards in hours, the US in weeks. "Move fast and break things" works for hardware in China, not America. Banning DJI doesn't close that gap. Faster iteration does. We ran this teardown with our FDEs and Atlas, our engineering agent platform. See our full analysis: arenaphysica.com/publication… Thanks to @JonathonPSine @AkhilIyer1, Maggie Gray and Shaun Donovan for reading drafts of this.

We went to LA to see if the hardware startups there have the Chinese work ethic. The investigation did NOT go well . . . for some. Full episode here - corememory.com/p/la-manufact…

It's hard to put into words the effect Emergent Ventures is having on India

Pixxel x Ashlee Vance. 🛰️ Our Founder & CEO, @awaisahmedna, sat down with @ashleevance and the @corememory team for a conversation spanning space, Earth observation, and what it takes to build planetary infrastructure. A great afternoon sharing Pixxel’s journey, where we’re headed next, and the ideas shaping the future of space and Earth intelligence. 🌍

We sent @kyliebytes to Waterloo to try and find out why the engineers are so cracked corememory.com/p/university-…

how it started / how its going <3

What a night! 🎉 We had a blast bringing together some curious minds for an evening of deep tech, good conversations and great company. Big thanks to the @corememory team & @ashleevance for doing this one with us! Here’s to more of these!

You ever have that thing where you're working late into the night while your team heads off to an EDM thing in Bengaluru and tries to produce a @brexHQ ad so you'll still like them?

The US has one last chance to get back in the solar game, and it all revolves around perovskites. We get into the history of the solar industry and why the US might be able to mount a comeback against China . . . or not on this week's pod with solar big brain @joeljean9 corememory.com/p/swift-solar…