Spacetech startup, Skyroot Aerospace has raised $51 million in Series-B financing round led by GIC, making it the largest funding round in the nascent sector.
Post the investment, Mayank Rawat, Managing Director of GIC India Direct Investment Group, will be joining the board of Skyroot.
ALSO READ: Skyroot Aerospace raises $4.5 million in a bridge round to Series B
About Skyroot
The four-year-old startup built and tested the country’s first privately developed cryogenic, hypergolic-liquid, and solid fuel-based rocket engines, using advanced composite and 3D-printing technologies in its product development.
“This round will help us get to full-fledged commercial satellite launch scale within a year from now. We have started booking payload slots for our upcoming launches,” Naga Bharath Daka, Co-Founder and COO of Skyroot, said.
The startup is promoting the country’s first privately developed space launch vehicles. The Vikram series of launch vehicles is named after Vikram Sarabhai, the Father of India’s space programme. Built with an all-carbon-fiber structure, they can launch up to 800 kg of payloads to Low Earth Orbit (LEO).
ALSO READ: Skyroot Aerospace test-fires solid propulsion rocket engine
Trajectory of hyper-growth
“The fresh round of funding follows the Government’s major thrust to the space sector by opening it up to private sector players, including startups and encouraging private investments into the sector,” Pawan Kumar Chandana, Co-Founder and CEO of Skyroot, said.
“This round puts us on a trajectory of hyper-growth by funding all of our initial developmental launches, and enables building infrastructure to meet high launch cadence required by our satellite customers,” he said in a statement on Friday.
He said the company was planning to cater to the growing demand from the international small satellite market.
Skyroot is the first startup to sign an agreement with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) for sharing facilities and expertise.
Published on
September 02, 2022
