Hammer: Roadrunner Venture Studios expects a ‘lighthouse year’ in 2025

Adam Hammer said 2025 will be a “lighthouse year” for Roadrunner Venture Studios, which plans to bring a business outside New Mexico into its portfolio of startups.

“I think of the lighthouse as the beacon to shore, and it’s a beacon out to the world of where that home is,” said Hammer, the company’s CEO and cofounder. “What we are trying to do is make New Mexico a home — a harbor, if you will — for founders, innovators and people who want to create things in the world.”

Hammer’s goal for Roadrunner, entering its second full calendar year, follows a recent $50 million earmark from the State Investment Council for the studio to invest in the handful of companies it incubates.

Roadrunner helps build startups by offering them access to capital and services, such as advisers, product roadmapping, human resources and recruiting, legal services, and lab and office space. In return, the startups give Roadrunner a piece of ownership.

The company this year plans to graduate at least two of the three portfolio companies it launched in 2023 — Inaedis and Hydrosonics — and add another three startups by the end of 2025, Hammer said. Fab.AI, the other portfolio company, will be retooled “into something that is a little bit more hard tech, advanced manufacturing focused,” he said.

The company is also working through various partnerships, including with the University of New Mexico, to build a commercialization boot camp for students interested in learning how to turn different types of technology into products or companies. And it is partnering with Sandia National Laboratories and the Federal Laboratory Consortium “to help bridge that gap between how investors think about building companies and how the labs think about licensing, adoption and tech-readiness levels,” Hammer said.

He said Roadrunner in 2025 will target startups involved in robotics, advanced manufacturing and photonics. The studio’s $50 million investment from the SIC — restructured from a $100 million commitment made in 2022 to America’s Frontier Fund, which founded Roadrunner with a $10 million backing — will allow it to invest in the portfolio companies and attract at least one out-of-state business to New Mexico.

“It just allows us to strengthen the value proposition for the state,” Hammer said.

Bringing a company from outside the state to Roadrunner’s studio, Hammer said, also shows “the potential so many of us know about New Mexico.”

“If we’re able to show some semblance of being a lighthouse this year, we’ll be able to realize some of that potential that ... I think a lot of folks that believe in this state know is there but just has not been realized yet,” Hammer said.