Almost 20 years after starting her career as a child actress, Bridgit Mendler is now heading into the boardroom as CEO of a new start-up company.
The 31-year-old began her career as a child actress in 2004 when she was just 11 years old with a dubbing role in the animated film “The Legend of Buddha.”
She also had roles in Jonas, Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel and The Secret World of Arrietty before breaking out in Disney Channel's Good Luck Charlie.
While she worked relatively steadily in 2019, she spent the last few years studying, earning degrees from USC and MIT and studying at Harvard Law School.
Now she's ready to enter the business world and serve as CEO of new space startup Northwood Space, which has raised $6.3 million in seed funding via CNBC.
Almost 20 years after starting her career as a child actress, Bridgit Mendler is now heading into the boardroom as CEO of a new start-up company
Now she's ready to enter the business world and serve as CEO of new space startup Northwood Space, which has raised $6.3 million in seed funding via CNBC
She also used X (formerly Twitter) to quote and retweet the CNBC story with an announcement of her own.
'Expect the unexpected! I'm thrilled to announce our $6.3 million in seed funding led by @foundersfund and @a16z, with participation from @CapitalAlso, @LongJourneyVC, @BoxGroup and @humbavc. Mendler began.
“At @NorhwoodSpace we aim to build an information highway between Earth and space,” she added.
“From the beginning, we are designing shared ground infrastructure to expand access to space,” she continued.
“We still have a lot of work to do, but that's the fun. “If you're keen to build quickly and see your work translated into real impact in locations around the globe, then we're looking for you at Northwood,” she concluded with a link to Northwood's careers page.
Mendler also recently spent time at the Federal Communications Commission's new space office, where she “completely fell in love with space law.”
“The vision is an information highway between Earth and space.” Space is becoming easier in so many different dimensions, but the actual transfer of data to and from space is still difficult. “You're having difficulty finding an access point to contact your satellite,” she said.
The company will not focus on building satellite rockets, but rather on ground stations, which are described as “typically large and often circular antennas connected to satellites in space.”
She also used X (formerly Twitter) to quote and retweet the CNBC story with an announcement of her own
Mendler also recently spent time at the Federal Communications Commission's new space office, where she “completely fell in love with space law.”
“The vision is an information highway between Earth and space.” Space is becoming easier in so many different dimensions, but the actual transfer of data to and from space is still difficult. “You're having difficulty finding an access point to contact your satellite,” she said
“The vision is an information highway between Earth and space.” Space is becoming easier in so many different dimensions, but the actual transfer of data to and from space is still difficult. “You're having difficulty finding an access point to contact your satellite,” she said
Mendler co-founded the company with her husband, Griffin Cleverly, who will serve as chief technology officer, and head of software Shaurya Luthra
She revealed that the company's name comes from a lake in New Hampshire where the idea for the company first came about while she was spending time there with her family during the COVID-19 pandemic
“For me, the ground side is important because it's actually about educating people about the effects of space,” she added
Mendler co-founded the company with her husband, Griffin Cleverly, who will serve as chief technology officer, and head of software Shaurya Luthra.
She revealed that the company's name comes from a lake in New Hampshire where the idea for the company first came about while she was spending time there with her family during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“While everyone else was making their sourdough starters, we were building antennas out of whatever crap we could find at Home Depot… and receiving data from them.” [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration] Satellites,” said Mendler.
“For me, the ground side is important because it's actually about educating people about the effects of space,” she added.
Clever added that a “colossal” amount of data is now being transported to and from satellites and that the company wants to make the data transfer more efficient.
“We need an approach so that these companies can get the data reliably and in the quantities they need,” he said.
They want to be able to deliver these ground stations “within days, not months,” with Luthra adding that installing an antenna takes 18 months.
The company aims to go in the same direction as Amazon Web Services or Microsoft's Azure, which provides server space so companies don't have to build their own servers.
“It enables space companies to respond much more quickly to emerging use cases and missions,” Cleverly added. The company hopes to conduct its first test with a spacecraft in orbit later this year.