Media That Drives the Next Conversation

Early-stage technology companies live and die by the next conversation. It is the meeting to progress a deal forward, the introduction that unlocks opportunity, the prescient observation that collapses the distance between present and future.

Intake Media teams with entrepreneurs advancing U.S. national security to deliver messaging, collateral, and content that pinpoints how products solve problems, and propels a pitch to travel further. Together, we increase the velocity of founder-led sales.

What We Offer

Strategic Messaging. Drawing on lived experience and market signals, we build the foundational document for all company communications, paired with a quarterly roadmap that aligns the team and activates a network to take action on the company’s behalf.

Brand Collateral. We take your core messaging and create a repo — decks, video, briefs, one-pagers, templates. Reinforce top themes during face-to-face interactions, and make sure the message resonates, long after the meeting is over.

High-Impact Content. We identify specific opportunities to educate the customer and produce deeply-researched and detail-oriented public affairs, whitepapers, video, and events. Create high-visibility moments to meet new people, and deliver content that sets up the next conversation.

Who We Work With

Intake Media teams with entrepreneurs working to solve hard problems in critical technology areas for America's national security, on Earth and in space. Primarily, we tailor our offerings to enable early-stage companies to over-deliver on the strategic objectives that matter most for the growth of a business.

Launch. We build the end-to-end machine that helps a small team of technologists arrive onto the scene as an established company that is focused and ready to deliver, today.

Fund. We create an integrated communications package that reinforces the data, narrative, and plan at the heart of a successful pitch, and build the playbook to navigate the many levels of the public and private funding landscape.

Grow. Applying an account-based marketing approach, we fortify the GTM process with ongoing and targeted content that connects the customer and their urgent problem to the solution delivered by value-added technology.

Who We Are

Stephen Babcock applies experience at the intersection of media, entrepreneurship, and VC to produce great content that delivers business value. Whether quarterbacking strategy, building process, concocting a new product, or putting the right words together, he applies hard-won lessons from more than two decades, and continues to learn every day.

VC. Stephen served as Head of Media at Squadra Ventures, a venture capital fund that invests in early-stage cyber and national security companies. In this role, he provided brand strategy, video, PR, sales content, and event production to support fundraising and go-to-market for the fund and its portfolio companies. Through this experience, he learned how to create collaboratively with founders, and the importance of building integrated campaigns around content distribution and events to nail the preparation, execution and follow-up.

Startups. Stephen served as an editor and product leader inside an early-stage startup as he built, launched, and operated The Current, a B2B media platform for ecommerce professionals. He founded and produced the daily curated newsletter Baltimorning, and served as founding managing editor of NOLA Defender, a digital daily covering New Orleans news, arts, and culture. Through this experience, he learned how to build from the ground up, and internalized the bias toward action and shipping product that defines early-stage companies.

Journalism. Stephen had a front row seat to the 2010s-era growth of the cyber and national security entrepreneurial ecosystem in the National Capital Region as an editor and reporter at Technical.ly, the tech news network. He served as a reporter in varying capacities at The New York Times, the New Orleans Times-Picayune, The Rio Grande Sun of Española, New Mexico, and The Patriot Ledger of Quincy, Mass. Through this experience, he honed a superpower to deliver high-quality content at a high volume and velocity, and developed a knack for communicating dense concepts in terms that make sense to all.

How We Work

Project-Based. Our work is tightly scoped to a focused timeline and centered on concrete deliverables. It’s all designed to deliver at the fast pace and iterative cycle of early-stage companies. No retainers.

Founder-Led. An entrepreneur is a company's best salesperson, best fundraiser, and best spokesperson. We partner directly with the founding team, creating work that advances their priorities and enables their success. We are collaborative.

Research-Backed. Using interviews and research skills honed over two decades in media, we go deep with the team to understand the product and listen to the market to validate the problem. This results in content that is fluent in the particular language of the business, and adaptive to the latest intelligence. We speak tech.

Open Content

Intake Media provides educational content that delivers value for the national security innovation community. We make a portion of our content publicly available under the Intake Media banner. This is open source — it is free to access and created without monetary exchange.

Interviews. Intake Media interviews entrepreneurs building national security technology. These interviews, combined with our independent analysis, serve as the source of written, audio, and visual content. Book an Interview.

Newsletter. Intake Media curates a weekly newsletter providing updates on the latest news, events, and jobs in national security innovation, with a focus on founders and innovation in technology and business. Subscribe to our newsletter.

Social Media. Stephen Babcock posts regularly on LinkedIn to illuminate key trends and spotlight leaders in national security innovation. Follow Stephen Babcock on LinkedIn.

Office Hours. Stephen Babcock holds regular office hours for introductions and knowledge exchange. Please reserve 15 minutes, and share any background materials that can accelerate our learning asynchronously in advance. He will read them. Book the next conversation.