MILCOM Founders Podcast – Episode 30: Randy Mullen, Founder of Sightline Ventures and Sightline Capital

Show Notes

Join host Rod Loges as he sits down with Randy Mullen, Jr., founder of Sightline Ventures and Sightline Capital, dual platforms supporting high-impact dual-use startups in the defense innovation ecosystem. Randy leads a tech-enabled team helping founders win DOD contracts and scale mission-critical capabilities for national security.

In this episode:

• How a college student working part-time discovered military service during the 2008 financial crisis
• Why Randy chose the Air Force over other branches and the role his mother's intuition played
• The three core values that guide Sightline: integrity, excellence, and faith-based leadership
• How 12 years in Air Force acquisitions taught Randy what defense contracting really needs
• The "sightline" metaphor: aligning front and rear sights to hit the target with your business strategy
• A real example of how Sightline helped a manufacturing company keep B-2 bombers flying during Operation Midnight Hammer

Key takeaways:

• Faith-based leadership and business values are not separate things when you run the company
• The best mentors live their values rather than just talk about them
• Quality of clients matters far more than quantity, especially for long-term partnership
• Technological supremacy, not military size, will determine national security in future conflicts
• A founder's spouse must be informed and bought in from day one, not surprised later
• Starting a company is one of the hardest things you can do, and it's not the right path for everyone

Guest: Randy Mullen, Founder, Sightline Ventures and Sightline Capital

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/randy-mullen-jr-44bb4757/
• Website: https://sightline.tech/

Randy Mullen is the founder of Sightline Ventures and Sightline Capital, a dual platform supporting high-impact dual-use startups in the defense innovation ecosystem. At Sightline Ventures, Randy leads a tech-enabled team helping founders win DOD contracts across IML, digital engineering, med tech, cyber, quantum, and advanced manufacturing. 

His team provides business development, capture, and proposal management services to accelerate growth through non-dilutive funding. At Sightline Capital, he invests directly in portfolio companies building for the front lines of national security as they scale into defense and commercial markets. Randy also serves as a contracting officer in the US Air Force Reserve. 

With over 15 years of experience in defense contracting as an active duty officer, he led research and development at the National Reconnaissance Office for signals intelligence platforms and served as lead contracting officer for a multibillion-dollar satellite radar portfolio with deployments across Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Kuwait, Kosovo, and Jordan.

Looking ahead: Sightline continues expanding its portfolio of defense tech companies while building out its capital arm, with strategic focus on robotics, AI, and cybersecurity as critical capabilities for national security.

The MilCom Founders Podcast champions and celebrates military community business founders. Each episode brings practical insights from successful veteran entrepreneurs.

Sponsored by One Degree Financial www.onedegreefinancial.com

Want to support veteran entrepreneurs? Learn about the Dick Loges Veteran Entrepreneur Scholarship Fund at milcomfounders.com