SAN FRANCISCO – CesiumAstro, a startup specializing in phased array communications payloads, raised $65 million in a Series B+ investment round announced June 18.
With the additional funding, CesiumAstro will “continue to grow the company because we’re seeing so much demand that we need to scale every division,” Shey Sabripour, CesiumAstro founder and CEO, told SpaceNews.
CesiumAstro plans to expand its staff to bolster research and development and manufacturing both domestically and internationally.
Since its founding in 2017, CesiumAstro has raised $156 million in equity including $60 million from an initial Series B funding round two years ago.
Demand Drivers
Sabripour sees two primary reasons demand is growing for phased array communications payloads.
“We as human beings are mobile and we want our data in our cars, our phones and our airplanes,” Sabripour said. “On the military side, the amount of data that has to transfer from the center command to the warfighter on drones, aircraft and satellites is increasing.”
In addition, artificial intelligence is heightening demand for data communications.
Autonomous vehicles, for example, often generate a terabyte of data per day from their cameras and sensors.
“All this hunger for data requires a revolution in telecommunication,” Sabripour said.
Space and In-Flight Connectivity
Trousdale Ventures led the latest funding round. The Development Bank of Japan and Quanta Computer matched Trousdale’s investment. Additional participants include Kleiner Perkins, Lavrock Ventures, L3Harris Technologies, InMotion Ventures, Matter Venture Partners, MESH Ventures and Assembly Ventures.
“We have unwavering confidence in Shey’s leadership and CesiumAstro’s team and believe this investment will propel their mission to deliver scalable space tech for a range of applications,” Phillip Sarofim, Trousdale Venture founding partner and CEO, said in a statement.
Last year, CesiumAstro, a company known for supplying phased array antennas for satellites, entered the in-flight connectivity market.
“CesiumAstro’s full-mission payloads for space and air have huge potential to enable the next generation of connectivity solutions,” Masao Masuda, Development Bank of Japan managing executive officer, said in a statement.
Headquartered in Austin, Texas, CesiumAstro has offices in Colorado, California and the United Kingdom.
CesiumAstro’s first antenna flew in December as part of an optical communications and navigation payload for CACI International, a defense contractor based in Reston, Virginia.
RocketLab has also subcontracted CesiumAstro to provide antennas as part of a $515 million contract with the Space Development Agency for 18 military satellites slated to launch in mid-2027.
