Bengaluru, 7 September

Indian space-tech company Pixxel on Monday announced it had raised $100 million in a Series C funding round co-led by Temasek and Seraphim, taking its total funding to $195 million. The round also saw participation from 360 ONE Asset, IMM Investment and existing investors including Radical Ventures and growX ventures.

The company said the funding was the largest single funding round raised by an Indian space-tech company and would support its expansion across the space-tech value chain.

Pixxel, which began with hyperspectral satellites, has expanded into Earth intelligence software through Aurora and satellite systems for commercial and sovereign missions. The new funding will accelerate its next-generation Honeybee hyperspectral constellation, including shortwave infrared sensing, synthetic aperture radar and ultra-high-resolution optical imaging. The first Honeybee satellite is expected to launch in 2027.

The company will also develop Aurora as an intelligence layer for decision-ready insights, expand sovereign Earth observation systems for civil, defence and intelligence applications, and increase satellite manufacturing capacity in India and the US.

Pixxel said it had deployed six Firefly satellites in two years, forming the world’s highest-resolution commercial hyperspectral constellation. It has also secured contracts with NASA and the NRO, won multiple iDEX challenges and unveiled an orbital data-centre demonstration satellite.

The company was selected by IN-SPACe to lead India’s first public-private Earth observation constellation of 12 satellites. Founder and CEO Awais Ahmed said the funding would help build “planetary infrastructure” to make a changing planet understandable in time to act.