Jeff Karras is a General Partner at America's Frontier Fund and co-founder of Alter Venture Partners, bringing over 20 years of venture capital experience to the intersection of deep tech, national security, and U.S. strategic competitiveness. With more than 40 investments and 23 exits - including 6 IPOs - he has backed companies spanning semiconductors, advanced manufacturing, synthetic biology, and AI. Before pivoting to frontier tech, he helped build SingTel Innov8's North American and Israeli operations and spent nearly a decade at Levensohn Venture Partners. A licensed pilot based in San Francisco, he is among a small cohort of investors who believe the most important technology companies of the next decade will emerge from the overlap of commercial innovation and government-scale problems.
Frank Ferrante is the CEO of ForwardEdge ASIC, a Lockheed Martin subsidiary dedicated to advancing U.S. domestic semiconductor chip design. A 30-year veteran of the semiconductor industry, Ferrante has held leadership roles at Intel (Senior Director of Military, Aerospace and Government), Wolfspeed (VP of Worldwide Automotive Sales and Marketing), and Altera. He is a vocal advocate for U.S. advanced manufacturing policy, having advised policymakers on the CHIPS Act, SHIP, and RAMP-C initiatives. Under his leadership, ForwardEdge ASIC achieved U.S. Government Trusted IC Vendor Status in February 2026 and selected the MIPS S8200 for mission-critical autonomous platform ASICs.