Before Zack Eakin sold investors on his new startup, he practiced on Palmer Luckey.
When he left Luckey’s defense startup, Anduril, in 2024 to start a new composites company called Layup Parts, Luckey — along with co-founders Brian Schimpf and Matt Grimm — let him workshop the pitch.
He got different feedback from each, Eakin told TechCrunch. Grimm helped him think about how to pitch VCs, Schimpf (Anduril’s CEO) pushed him on strategy, while Luckey — ever the fundraiser — guided him on the storytelling.
This miniature boot camp appears to have worked. Two years ago, Eakin raised a $9 million seed round. The startup announced Tuesday it has raised another $42 million in a Series A funding round led by dual-use venture fund Marlinspike, with participation from new investors Cerberus Ventures and Pinegrove Venture Partners, and existing backers Founders Fund and LUX Capital.
It’s a tidy sum for the Huntington Beach, California startup, which employs just 60 people or so. And much of it will go toward people. Layup Parts used most of its seed money on capital expenditures. Eakin wants to use the new funding to grow the startup’s ranks and move into a bigger facility this year. The goal is to make ordering custom parts made of carbon fiber or fiberglass as easy as if they were sold on Amazon.
