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Kevin Weil, a veteran tech executive known for stints at Twitter, Meta, Planet Labs and OpenAI, has joined the board of Stoke Space, a well-funded Seattle startup building reusable rockets to compete with SpaceX.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s real simple for me,\u201d Stoke CEO Andy Lapsa told TechCrunch of meeting Weil when he cofounded Stoke in 2020 and soon after joined Y Combinator\u2019s winter batch<\/a>. \u201cI came out of engineering, started a company, had no idea how to fundraise. I had no idea how Silicon Valley worked. I had no network. Kevin [an early investor in the company with his wife Elizabeth, through their fund Scribble Ventures<\/a>] comes with all of that background and was able to help me think about fundraising and getting the company off the ground.<\/p>\n The two kept talking while Lapsa raised $1.34 billion \u2014 including a $510 million Series D<\/a> funding round in 2025 \u2014 to build a rapidly reusable rocket that could fly this year. Now, the time is apparently right for Weil to join the board as a director to help continue scaling the company. Stoke declined to make Weil available for an interview, and he didn\u2019t respond to TechCrunch\u2019s outreach.<\/p>\n Weil\u2019s past work has focused on digital products and platforms, which aren\u2019t obviously on Stoke\u2019s roadmap. He was most recently the head of OpenAI\u2019s efforts to accelerate scientific research, leaving the company<\/a> after that program\u2019s work was spread more widely across the frontier lab in April. He had previously served as OpenAI\u2019s chief product officer from June 2024 until October 2025.<\/p>\n Weil\u2019s last job raises one obvious question: OpenAI\u2019s Sam Altman was reportedly<\/a> kicking the tires on Stoke last year, contemplating an investment in his own SpaceX competitor. Could Weil be the link between the frontier AI lab and a possible partner in space? Lapsa declined to comment on \u201cgossip and rumors\u201d about OpenAI, saying Weil\u2019s role was to focus on Stoke itself.<\/p>\n Stoke is building a rocket, Nova, that is intended to be completely reusable and can be flown again and again. No one has ever done that before, with the SpaceX coming the closest with its enormous Starship rocket. The technological challenges of reusing a rocket\u2014particularly its ability to survive the extreme heat of reentering the Earth\u2019s atmosphere from space\u2014deterred even space investors with the deepest pockets. Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin, where Lapsa once worked, has flirted with the approach, but hasn\u2019t prioritized it.<\/p>\n Now, though, SpaceX\u2019s blockbuster stock market debut\u2014with much of its value resting on Elon Musk\u2019s promises<\/a> that Starship will be flying operational missions this year\u2014has proven Lapsa\u2019s foresight. Despite many billions of dollars invested in new launch vehicles, there aren\u2019t enough rockets to go around, and the next company to get a reasonably-priced rocket flying regularly promises to make a killing.<\/p>\n \u201cThe world is realizing that launch is still not solved,\u201d Lapsa said. \u201cThe idea of full, rapid reuse was a little bit out there at that time\u2026that\u2019s now been rather normalized, and people see the inevitable now.\u201d<\/p>\n Notably, the idea of building distributed data centers in space to leverage solar power and escape political restrictions on Earth has captured the imagination of some venture capitalists. The key obstacle there is the cost of getting all those computer chips into orbit. Space data centers \u201creally only make sense with full rapid reuse,\u201d Lapsa said, which could be a key differentiator for Stoke as its rocket starts flying.<\/p>\n Military contracts will also be key to the company\u2019s success, and Weil has experience bridging the gap between Silicon Valley and the Department of Defense; he was one of four tech movers and shakers<\/a> who joined the US Army Reserve in a bid to improve recruitment and cooperation between the Army and industry. And this isn\u2019t his first time in the space business. Weil served as the president of Planet Labs, a satellite earth observation company, for three years as it went public 2021.<\/p>\n Whatever Weil can add to the company\u2019s strategy as it closes in on delivering an operational launch vehicle, though, the company has to execute. <\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got a good chunk of the risk behind us, we\u2019ve got more to go,\u201d Lapsa said. \u201cWe\u2019ll work as hard as we can, and we\u2019ll go when it\u2019s ready.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission<\/a>. This doesn\u2019t affect our editorial independence.<\/em><\/p>\n