A Brand Highlight Conversation with Jacob Flores, Head of Research at Type One Ventures

There is a version of investing that asks what the return will be. And then there is the version that asks what kind of future the investment makes possible. Jacob Flores, Head of Research at Type One Ventures, is working firmly in the second category.

Type One Ventures takes its name from the Kardashev Scale — a framework developed by Soviet astrophysicist Nikolai Kardashev that ranks civilizations by their level of technological advancement. A Type One civilization has mastered its home planet and is beginning to extend its reach beyond it. That is the destination this firm is trying to fund. Flores, a former engineer and product manager with roughly a decade of experience across industries, leads the research function at Type One with a focus on AI, neurotech, and biotechnology.

The firm's investment lens is as much philosophical as it is financial. Type One looks for platform builders — companies whose core technology can be stacked across multiple applications, cultivating new marketplaces and entirely new categories of industry. Manufacturing in space is one clear example: in microgravity, it becomes possible to grow proteins, print circuits, and develop materials that cannot be produced the same way on Earth — yet those products have immediate, tangible value back on the ground.

The thesis extends well beyond orbit. Type One is also backing neurotechnology companies working to restore vision and movement for people who have lost those abilities, and longevity research aimed at extending healthy human life. Flores frames these not as moonshots for their own sake, but as the new foundation layer for an entirely new level of global industry.

This is a Brand Highlight. A Brand Highlight is a ~5 minute introductory conversation designed to put a spotlight on the guest and their company. Learn more

Host Marco Ciappelli, Co-Founder, ITSPmagazine

Guest Jacob Flores, Head of Research, Type One Ventures

Resources Type One Ventures Type One Ventures on LinkedIn

Want to tell your story? Full Length Brand Story Brand Spotlight Story Brand Highlight Story

Keywords: Jacob Flores, Type One Ventures, Marco Ciappelli, brand story, brand marketing, marketing podcast, brand highlight, space technology, deep tech, venture capital, multi-planetary civilization, Kardashev Scale, manufacturing in space, neurotech, longevity, AI, biotechnology, frontier technology, space investing, human longevity, platform builders

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When a production line stops, the financial damage is immediate — and the window to respond safely is narrower than most security teams realize. Rob Demain, CEO and Founder of e2e-assure, joins this Brand Highlight to explain why OT security demands a fundamentally different mindset than IT, and what organizations can do about it.

Operational technology runs the infrastructure that keeps the world moving — manufacturing floors, power grids, air traffic control systems. Rob Demain founded e2e-assure in 2013 and has spent the past seven years narrowing its focus to one discipline: SOC and MDR services. He calls it "specificity" — the principle that doing one thing with precision delivers better outcomes than spreading resources thin.

In IT security, the primary concern is data. In OT, the stakes are entirely different. Downtime is the real threat. For a manufacturing business, minutes of halted production translate directly into significant financial loss. That distinction changes everything about how security teams must respond. The "safety first" rule in OT means responders sometimes have to run alongside a threat rather than immediately neutralize it — because disconnecting systems could halt the production line entirely.

The most common attack path into OT environments runs through IT: adversaries compromise IT first, then move laterally into OT systems. Supply chain risk is the second major vector. Firmware updates, software patches, and third-party management systems all represent potential entry points. Detection takes longer too — OT systems often lack the endpoint tools that trigger fast alerts, leaving threats to surface as subtle pattern deviations over extended periods.

This is a Brand Highlight — a short introductory conversation designed to put a spotlight on the guest and their company. Learn more: https://www.studioc60.com/creation#highlight

GUEST
Rob Demain, CEO & Founder, e2e-assure
LinkedIn: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/rob-demain-01733468

RESOURCES
e2e-assure website: https://e2e-assure.com
OT Downtime and Remediation Gaps Research: https://e2e-assure.com

Are you interested in telling your story?
Full Length Brand Story: https://www.studioc60.com/content-creation#full
Brand Spotlight Story: https://www.studioc60.com/content-creation#spotlight
Brand Highlight Story: https://www.studioc60.com/content-creation#highlight

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⬥EPISODE NOTES⬥

Walk the floor at RSAC Conference 2026 and you will find boxing rings, petting zoos, agentic AI everywhere, and very few answers to the question that actually matters: why should anyone trust you with their security? Sean Martin and Marco Ciappelli have been watching this pattern for more than a decade -- and in this short On Location conversation, they turn the camera on themselves and on the problem they built Studio C60 to solve.

The conversation starts with a pin. A small ITSPmagazine swag item from roughly ten years ago, sitting in Sean's hand at RSAC Conference. Marco traces the thread from there -- back to 2012, back to his first time on the conference floor, back to a joke he made that has never stopped being true: they are still selling the box. The packaging has changed -- servers became SaaS, disks became dashboards -- but the instinct to lead with the product rather than the outcome has not.

Sean frames it cleanly: the messaging is the innovation. But the message only lands when it connects the technology to how teams actually use it, to what that enables the business to do, to why it matters beyond the booth. Marco extends it further: if you sound like everyone else, there is no music -- only noise. Every instrument is playing, but there is no song.

That is the gap Studio C60 exists to close. Drawing on decades of combined experience in cybersecurity, go-to-market strategy, journalism, and brand storytelling, Sean and Marco offer clients something the expo floor rarely demonstrates: the ability to articulate not just what a product does, but what it means -- for the team, for the business, for the people it serves.

The work ranges from a single consulting session to full campaign development and retainer partnerships. It starts with an honest assessment: who are you, who needs you, and what do you sound like right now? For startups especially, that starting point is where everything else begins.

What the floor at RSAC Conference 2026 makes clear, year after year, is that attention is cheap and memory is rare. The brands that last are the ones that earn it -- not with a boxing ring, but with a story worth repeating.

⬥HOSTS⬥

Sean Martin, CISSP -- Co-Founder, ITSPmagazine & Studio C60 | Host, Redefining CyberSecurity Podcast & Music Evolves Podcast | https://www.seanmartin.com/

Marco Ciappelli -- Co-Founder, ITSPmagazine & Studio C60 | Host, An Analog Brain In A Digital Age Podcast | https://www.marcociappelli.com/

⬥RESOURCES⬥

RSAC Conference 2026 -- Follow our coverage: https://www.itspmagazine.com/rsac-2026-conference-san-francisco-usa-cybersecurity-event-infosec-conference-coverage

Studio C60 | https://www.studioc60.com

The Future of Cybersecurity Newsletter (Sean Martin) | https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/7108625890296614912/

An Analog Brain In A Digital Age Newsletter (Marco Ciappelli) | https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/7079849705156870144/

On Location | https://www.itspmagazine.com/on-location

⬥KEYWORDS⬥

sean martin, marco ciappelli, rsac conference 2026, rsac 2026, studio c60, itspmagazine, brand storytelling, cybersecurity marketing, go-to-market strategy, messaging and positioning, agentic ai, expo floor, brand differentiation, content production, cybersecurity branding, on location

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