Torsten Reil
Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Helsing. On 2 shows, 2 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
founderexecutivescientistinvestor@torstenreil ↗LinkedIn ↗helsing.ai ↗
Torsten Reil is the co-founder and co-CEO of Helsing, a European defense technology unicorn that develops artificial intelligence software and autonomous defense systems. Previously, he researched complex systems at Oxford and founded the animation and gaming tech startup NaturalMotion, which was acquired by Zynga.
2shows
2appearances
66statements
15resolved
12supported
0contradicted
80%fully supported
16said about them ↓ Everything Torsten Reil said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Reil: The era of military tanks is probably over
“And so I think the area of tanks is probably over.”
Torsten Reil: Helsing will never sell the company
“We try really to keep the foot on the gas really aggressively, because we want to build a company that really matters, and we will never sell the company.”
Helsing: AI took full control of Gripen fighter jet in dogfight test
“Last year we flew a real fighter jet and we flew the Saab Gripen over the Baltic Sea. And when I say we, our AI did and took full control of the plane in air combat against and another Gripen, which was human controlled. And so we flew three air combat scenari…”
Reil: Manned fighter jets will struggle against superhuman autonomous swarms
“Crude manned, you know, fighter jets were going to be very difficult to deploy in the future because you'll, you'll end up Facing these swarms of autonomous fighter jets with superhuman capabilities, and it's not science fiction.”
Torsten Reil: Foreign allies will eventually lack capability to protect Europe
“Over time there just won't be, I think the capability even of partners and as it looks to also not the willingness to do so.”
Torsten Reil: Founder ambition matters more than regulatory or tax policy
“I actually think none of this stuff really matters that much. I think what really matters is founder quality and founder ambition. So I think for a country to be successful, they should attract the most aggressive founders. And everything else is a lot less im…”
Torsten Reil: A Russian threat to NATO's eastern flank is extremely plausible
“I think the threat is extremely plausible in the next few years.”
Torsten Reil: A China-Taiwan conflict will occur much sooner than 10 years
“I, again, I think it's plausible that there will be a conflict. When? It's hard to tell. I don't think it's 10 years away if it happens. It's probably quite a lot sooner than that.”
Torsten Reil: Exceptional teams work best without process, stand-ups, or deadline forecasts
“I used to think that, that you needed to make sure that there was always a degree of process when teams work together on something and including something new. I have now learned that it's possible with exceptional people to let's, let's just let them get on w…”
Torsten Reil: If running ByteDance, he would immediately shut down TikTok
“Probably ByteDance, and I would shut down TikTok immediately.”
Reil: 100,000 strike drones would destroy 3,000 invading tanks within hours
“The deterrence that you get out of having a very large number of strike drones at your border, I think is, is pretty is pretty strong, and the reason is that if you turn up with tanks on the other side, let's say you turn up with 3000 tanks, 100,000 strike dro…”
Reil: Future warfare will be autonomous machine battles where humans cannot survive
“I think it's going to be a battle of materiel. It's machines versus machines. The reason for this is that the autonomous mass, as we call it, so the number of drones that can fly in a coordinated way is getting better and better, and it's going to be very hard…”
Reil: Sending humans into battle will become unethical, forcing ground robot adoption
“And at the same time, if you want to have humans on the battlefield, I think it's going to be very difficult. And I think the trend is going to be, and I think people are realizing this, is that it's going to be unethical to send humans on a battlefield where …”
Reil: Banks grouped defense in the same bucket as porn and gambling
“Back then the defense of a country or of a democratic society was grouped for banks in the same bucket as pornography and gambling and smoking.”
Reil: Europe lacks breakout companies because founders lack aggression
“And then we sadly have a continent where we don't have breakout companies because people just lack the aggression.”
Reil: Social media commentary is entirely worthless and net negative
“I think commentary is entirely worthless and it has almost, it has no positive contribution. The only thing that it does is It I think it drags some people down so it has a net negative benefit, and it obviously is, is encouraged through you know, the way the …”
Helsing's 2021 pitch deck predicted invasions of Ukraine and Taiwan
“When we started Helsing in March, 2021, we actually put one of our slides that we thought there were going to be two galvanizing events. One of them was going to be an invasion of Ukraine by Russia, the other one an invasion of Taiwan by China.”
Defense primes risk a Tesla-style disruption if they ignore software
“The thing that we have to avoid is the Tesla moment for the defense sector. If we collectively, including the primes, don't understand that and don't adapt, the same thing is going to happen to defense, As happened to the car industry.”
Torsten Reil: Four exceptional engineers outperform eight good ones for less money
“You can achieve a lot in particular around software with three to four exceptional people. And so we'd rather have a team of four exceptional people than eight good people. It makes everything easier. It's also cheaper, by the way, even though you pay above ma…”
Torsten Reil: Needing weekly 1-on-1s with senior leaders signals operational problems
“The people I work with are usually senior and don't need that much guidance. If I need a one-to-one with them every week, I think something's probably gonna, is probably going wrong.”
Torsten Reil: Eliminating 1-on-1 meetings had zero negative impact on performance
“I used to do them religiously, by the way, I just stopped doing them. It hasn't had a negative impact.”
Torsten Reil: Most Western drone companies build low-volume, boutique hardware
“Most drone companies right now build small numbers of quite exquisite drones. They're quite expensive. You know, it's sometimes a bit of a boutique business where people really care about the hardware and the carbon and everything else.”
Torsten Reil: Deterrence requires software speed and tens of thousands of drones
“You can counter them but you can't counter them with the current systems that we have. You can't just have exquisite, exquisite systems like tanks or artillery guns that are not particularly well connected that take a while to take a shot. You need to work bas…”
Torsten Reil: Single operators will control autonomous drone swarms by 2025
“At the moment you have one operator operating one drone. That's going to happen It's going to happen quite quickly that that's going to change, and you'll be able, as a single operator, to control multiple drones, and that trend, I think, we'll see playing out…”
The other half of the tape: Torsten Reil's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 15 times in 6 episodes across the shows. 1 statement on the record names them. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Harry Stebbings 11Taavet Hinrikus 3David Senra 1
Statements about Torsten Reil, by other people (1)
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
20VC 14
David Senra 1
2026 2 mentions in 2 episodes 1 per episode
2025 9 mentions in 2 episodes 5 per episode
2024 4 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Torsten's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20VCLEDGER | Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Helsing | 1 | 37 | 71% 5/7 | full record on 20VC → |
| DAVID SENRALEDGER | Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Helsing | 1 | 29 | 88% 7/8 | full record on David Senra → |