Spacetech startup Skyroot Aerospace has raised a new round of capital from Singapore state investment firm Temasek, a year after the city-state's sovereign wealth fund GIC backed the Indian startup.
The Hyderabad-based startup has bagged $27.5 million in a pre-Series C round led by Temasek, it said on Monday. It has so far secured about $95 million in external capital across five rounds.
“This new capital propels us into commercial satellite launches, fuels tech innovation, attracts top talent, and amps up our launch frequency and capabilities,” the company said in a LinkedIn post.
Skyroot, founded in 2018, launched the country’s first-ever private rocket in November last year, with new government policies giving up a push to the fledgling sector and increasing opportunities for private sector participation.
The development comes less than two weeks after Agnikul, one of its local peers, secured about $26.7 million in its Series B round amid growing activity in the space-tech segment.
Agnikul, backed by the likes of Celesta Capital, Rocketship.vc, Artha Venture Fund, pi Ventures amongst others, is about to launch its first rocket Agnibaan, a private small satellite rocket.
Skyroot previously raised $50.5 million in September 2022 in a Series B round led by GIC, with participation from LNM India Internet Ventures. It previously raised $4.5 million in a bridge round led by Sherpalo Ventures. Wami Capital, former WhatsApp chief business officer Neeraj Arora and former Google executive Amit Singhal also joined the round at the time.
The company, founded by former Indian Space Research Organisation scientists Pawan Kumar Chandana and Naga Bharath Daka, is an aerospace manufacturer and commercial launch service provider. It partners with ISRO for sharing facilities and expertise.
Chandana told VCCircle the company will use the fresh capital to accelerate its launch cadence, expand its team and grow its critical production infrastructure.
"India is the most cost-efficient nation for building space systems as proven by our moon and Mars missions, which were done at a fraction of cost compared to similar missions globally," he said.
"We also have cutting-edge infrastructure for manufacturing, testing and launching space systems built over decades, and a stable regulatory environment... This makes it an attractive proposition for investments in innovative startups that can go global from India," he added.