Ben Marchionna’s Post

🎂🇺🇸 Today, I turned 34 years old, and America turned 248 years old. In the grand scheme of growing up and nation-building, we're both still very young. As I celebrate my birthday on this day of national significance, my thoughts are consumed by the words of Abraham Lincoln in his first inaugural address in 1861, 84 years after Independence Day: “The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely, they will be, by the better angels of our nature.” What was Lincoln getting at? Simply put, he was appealing to our common values and shared history, hoping to heal divisions and restore unity through our collective goodwill and moral sense. He believed that despite the current strife, Americans had the capacity to overcome their differences and reunite, guided by their better nature. As history viscerally demonstrated, it took four more years until those better angels of our nature emerged. But emerge they did. Lincoln's hopeful vision of unity drives me deeply. It’s part of what led me to take a leap of faith into government service at a time when many are fleeing such opportunities. It’s more challenging and more essential than ever. My birthday wish this year is simple: May we all reflect on and take a first step towards listening to the better angels of our nature. Unity, compassion, and a willingness to compromise are our strengths. Whether America wins is not decided by our differences, but by how we work together because of them. Happy Independence Day to all! [The painting is Writing the Declaration of Independence, 1776 / J.L.G. Ferris. It shows Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and John Adams meeting at Jefferson's lodging, on the corner of Seventh and High (Market) streets in Philadelphia, to review a draft of the Declaration of Independence.]

There's never been a cooler time to BUILD! 🚂🚀🏭🚗 The 900+ person waitlist for the inaugural #REINDUSTRIALIZE at Newlab / Michigan Central this week is a visceral symbol of that hunger for doing something more. For pushing the edge. For combining bits and atoms. It's time to start modernizing the U.S. industrial base. Mike Slagh, Kate Moon, and Aaron Slodov: You pulled off a kickass event. Thanks for hosting it in the City of Detroit. Countless founders and investors who had never been to Michigan (ever) said, "WOW. Detroit is much nicer than I thought it would be. We'll be back." 🏆 That's how you spark change. When Dan Gilbert is asked to talk about what's going on here, he says it's not possible to explain without visiting in person. It must be experienced. I couldn't agree more. There's something magic happening. The last two days have been absolutely nonstop action. Early breakfasts. Super late dinners. Scintillating conversation. An eagerness for thinking HUGE and acting fast. I'm both exhausted and THRILLED. Michigan Lieutenant Governor Garlin Gilchrist gave a rousing closing speech today before I introduced him to a flurry of founders and investors eager to see how they can grow their own businesses in Michigan, or help reindustrialize Michigan businesses. The opportunity is limitless. Shout out to some of the many wonderful innovators who made it here. I'm so pumped for all our follow-up chats! Venkat Viswanathan, Dug Song, Rob Meyerson, Rohit M., Daniel Feder, Addy First, Mai Bui, Tomás Álvarez Belón, Thilo M. Braun, Fred Addy, John F. Mahony, Paige Craig, Eric Snelgrove, Nathan P. Diller, Lenore Karafa, Timothy Rhatigan, Deeana Ahmed, Garuth A., Nick Snoad, Dan Madden, Taylor Sargent, Ellen M. Chang, JP Stewart, Asher Kraut, Van Espahbodi, Dan Goldin, Charly M.

I'm fired up and ready to go! Who's with me?! 🚀 A message to my fellow innovators: Since being announced by Governor Gretchen Whitmer as the State of Michigan's first-ever Chief Innovation Ecosystem Officer, I've been blown away by the passionate, enthusiastic response from countless innovation champions in the state and around the world. I'm in hardcore Listen and Learn mode. I want to understand from you what's working and why. What's not working and why. And where and how we should be steering the big ship that is the Michigan innovation economy. I want to hear your small ideas, your big ideas, and everything in between. More than anything, I care deeply about understanding how we get bigger and better, together. It's the only way we'll successfully compete and win on a global innovation marketplace. To the many of you who I haven't yet had the pleasure of meeting, I wanted to offer some color on my background. I hope it can be helpful in understanding what's shaping my world view... I was born and raised in Rochester, Michigan. My wife, Katie, and I met in high school, and completed our undergrad degrees together in Ann Arbor. After graduating, we moved to the Mojave Desert so I could work on national security innovation projects. (The most famous I'll ever be was when we were on HGTV House Hunters after buying our first house in the desert...) Meanwhile, a then-tiny clean tech startup in Ann Arbor named SkySpecs won the Accelerate Michigan Pitch Competition in 2014, leading Danny to their Series A fundraising and a need to grow their team. That moment created an opportunity which led to my wife and I moving back to Michigan from southern California. Then we stayed. And grew our family. We wouldn't have made our way back if not for that door opening. After helping SkySpecs grow into 26 countries, I joined John Langford's visionary hard tech startup near Washington, D.C. named Electra.aero building hybrid-electric aircraft. I flew to DC for a couple days nearly every week for the past three years. We were preparing to move our family to DC this summer as that growth opportunity expanded. Then I watched as the Michigan innovation narrative started to shift over the past year. More positivity, more optimism, and tools like the Innovation Fund, a Michigan Central revitalization, and innovation community building were all starting to come to fruition in a way they hadn't before. I decided I couldn't possibly miss the most exciting opportunity in a generation to help work with all of you to light the solid rocket boosters of our innovation economy that have been quietly assembled by so many stakeholders over the past decade. I viscerally believe in the power of innovation and entrepreneurship to attract and retain talent. It's the reason I'm here today, too! I'm so excited to be your partner as we get comfortable being a little uncomfortable building the future together. Thank you for all the work you do. IT'S TIME TO BUILD!

🎉📢 Electra.aero debuts a *second* cover story in Aviation Week Network magazine, and has announced a major milestone: the successful flight demonstration of takeoffs and landings in less than 170 feet! 🏆 This is a truly mind-blowing technical achievement. And it's just the beginning. 😍 Our first AvWeek cover was last July when the EL-2 tech demonstrator airplane was unveiled to the world. Since then, the EL-2 has safely completed well over two dozen substantial test flights. Many of these have been measured in hours, not minutes, of flight time. (Go Team Hybrid!) And all of them have been piloted by a real test pilot. 👀 Check out the full scoop and you'll catch a glimpse at Electra's 2040 turboelectric airliner concept, too. More on that in a future post! 😎 #startups #technology #innovation

🤵♂️🌠 The AIAA Gala at the The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is always one of my favorite events of the year! 👩🏼🏫 Met incoming University of Michigan College of Engineering Dean Karen Thole! I can now confidently say Michigan picked the perfect leader. The cherry on top: Karen will be the first female dean in our 170-year history! Michigan Aerospace Chair Carlos Cesnik and I are especially excited that she's a fellow aerospace engineer 😁 🚀 Honored to talk with Daisy Li and Khue Phan, two of the brightest rising stars in the aerospace industry, and winners of AIAA's 2024 Roger W. Kahn Scholarship. Good luck to both of you in the years ahead, and stay in touch! 🦨 Found two of my favorite former Lockheed Martin Skunk Works teammates, Al Romig and Edward Burnett. 🌳 Caught up with my friend Alex Kueppers who has invested in both of the clean energy startups I've worked at: SkySpecs and Electra.aero! ⚡ Hung out with the stellar Electra crew, past and present, including JP Stewart, Diana Siegel, Robie Samanta Roy, Barbara Zadina, and our investor Jeff Cunningham. 🧑🚀 Former NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration Astronaut Leland Melvin gave a rousing speech as he accepted the AIAA Public Service Award for "tirelessly promoting STEAM and aerospace to young people of all demographics." His new effort is Space4All. Check it out. 🍕 After being the last two people to leave the Kennedy Center at 11pm, my longtime co-conspirator Robie Samanta Roy and I went out for Italian food. "We'll have to make this quick" is what we said when we walked in. Famous last words. We shut the place down at 1am. Oops! No regrets. A hearty congratulations to the many other premier award winners and the 2024 Class of AIAA Fellows! This is gonna be a hard one to top.

What a wild and incredible #SOFWeek2024 with USSOCOM in Tampa last week! I'm always blown away by what I learn and who I meet here, including several random run-ins with friends. The Special Operations Forces community is so unique. Nobody embodies resilience, discipline, and teamwork better. It's insanely inspiring. 💪🚀 Each year at #SOFWeek, I spend a few hours with Electra.aero Board member and former Commander of U.S. Special Operations Command, General (retired) Doug Brown. General Brown joined the US Army in 1967 and rose from the rank of private to four-star general, an exceptionally rare and distinguished achievement. To put this in perspective, only 9 individuals have ever done this in U.S. military history, including Dwight Eisenhower, George Marshall, and Omar Bradley. I'm beyond fortunate to work with him regularly. He's become a tremendous friend and mentor. This year, Doug presented me with his commander's coin, a symbol used to recognize achievements, dedication, or exemplary service. I am deeply honored and humbled by his gesture. It'll serve as a lasting source of inspiration throughout my career and is now a cherished keepsake. Thank you, Doug! #Defense #Collaboration #Innovation

Reindustrialize is shaping up to be the MUST ATTEND summit on reinventing American manufacturing. And it's going down in my backyard, in a city on the rise: Detroit! 💎💪🏻 Well done, Mike, Kate, Aaron, and team 👏🏻

I got a funny message after booking an Airbnb for a short family trip this weekend: "We've never known anybody to have 84 reviews on Airbnb...and we've even hosted Airbnb employees. Way to travel!!!" 😅 Out of curiosity, I peeked at my Google Maps travel stats, which I started tracking around seven years ago. I've known that I travel a decent amount, but it was remarkable to see the aggregate. In that timeframe: 🏙 494 cities visited across 5 continents 🏨 208 unique hotels (doesn't count repeat stays or the Airbnbs) 👨✈️ 84 unique airports (318 visits to DTW, 152 to DCA, 40 to Amsterdam) 🛫 500+ Delta flights (45 so far this year) This got me thinking. Van Espahbodi and Asher Kraut recently told me I had the broadest Google Photos location heat map they'd ever seen. I didn't appreciate the gravity of their insight at the time but have since realized that breadth is my superpower! A favorite Mark Twain quote came to mind: "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime." Seeing all these places has been the most enriching personal growth experience imaginable. Travel has a way of stretching the mind and exposing us to the vast tapestries of people's lives and cultures. Travel has helped me think outside the box, too. It's a source of insights impossible to recreate elsewhere. That's especially helpful when building and scaling startups, which requires creativity and an uncanny ability to connect dots. You've got to see all the dots to be able to draw lines between them. The edge cases have been my favorite. The Australian Outback. The middle of the North Sea. Big city innovation hubs. Some rural wind farm in the Great Plains. An essential element is immersing yourself among the locals. They each have such wildly different backgrounds and belief systems. So much to learn. You've got to get comfortable being uncomfortable! I'm always hunting for new places that will stretch my mind. Where have you been that really stretched your thinking or sparked some new innovation? Why was that place so special? What spots are on your travel bucket list? #travel #innovation #growth

🤵🥂 Never pass up a chance to enjoy a Black Tie dinner! One of the things I've come to love about my role at Electra.aero is the opportunity to connect with senior government and national security leaders not just professionally but on a personal level as well. Last week in Denver, I had the honor of celebrating the new inductees to the Army Aviation Hall of Fame, including a Medal of Honor recipient. It's inspiring to be in a room with so many people committed to selfless service. Many have become good friends and great mentors as I've learned the ropes of #defensetech #innovation championship. In an era filled with ever-louder background noise, I've come to deeply appreciate the many exceptional professionals working quietly behind the scenes to make a real impact. A highlight of the evening was catching up with Lieutenant General (ret) Erik Peterson, former Deputy Chief of Staff (G-8) of the U.S. Army. I greatly admire his leadership style, friendship, and trailblazing approach to innovation. Plus, he sure makes retirement look good! Am I right?! It's truly energizing to collaborate with such dedicated individuals day in and day out. And even more so when we get to do it dressed to the nines! 😊