Mike Slagh

Post-pitch story

Mike Slagh pitched Shift with a mission that was easy to root for: helping military veterans translate their skills into careers in the tech industry. And for years, Shift delivered — raising capital from top-tier firms including Andreessen Horowitz and Expa, and building programs that moved real veterans into real tech jobs. Its flagship became the Defense Ventures Program, run with the Pentagon, placing service members inside Silicon Valley companies. Then the ground shifted: in 2024 the Pentagon abruptly ended funding for the program, which had become the company's primary revenue and impact driver. By December 2024, Shift had dissolved — a mission-driven company undone not by competition or product failure, but by a government budget decision. Slagh's own path kept pointing the same direction, though: in February 2025 he was appointed a special advisor to the Department of Defense, bringing his decade of experience connecting the military and tech worlds inside the building. Shift the company is gone, but the problem it worked on — the gap between the military and the innovation economy — is now literally part of its founder's job description.