A space-centric startup called Quindar says it has successfully closed an oversubscribed $6 million funding round that will give a boost to its cloud-hosted, AI-supported software platform for satellite management.
The seed extension round was led by the Seattle-area venture capital firm Fuse, with continuing investment from Y Combinator and Funders Club. The round builds upon last year’s initial seed round and brings total funding to date to $8.5 million, Quindar CEO and co-founder Nate Hamet told GeekWire in an email.
“The infusion of funding will propel our mission to manage satellites as efficiently as servers by utilizing AI-driven insights and operations to revolutionize the industry’s approach to spacecraft management,” Quindar said today in an announcement about the investment round.
Quindar, which takes its name from the beeping sound heard during Apollo-era radio transmissions, was founded in 2022. Although it has its home office in Denver, the company is taking a remote-first approach, with employees in Seattle; Los Angeles; San Francisco; Austin, Texas; and Washington, D.C. Sunny Bhagavathula, a co-founder as well as Quindar’s head of product, is based in Seattle.
Hamet, Bhagavathula and the company’s four other co-founders previously worked at OneWeb, which is building a satellite constellation to provide global internet access. Hamet said there are currently 10 employees on the team, plus several open positions in engineering and sales.
Quindar describes itself as “the Datadog for space,” with Amazon Web Services providing the cloud-based backbone for mission management as a service. Quindar’s software platform is designed to operate multiple types of satellites and payloads in an integrated way.
One of the company’s early partners is Norway-based Kongsberg Satellite Services, also known as KSAT, one of the world’s leading providers of spacecraft communication services. KSAT plans to use Quindar’s multi-mission platform in support of its new satellite operations business unit.
“We are working with a handful of commercial and government customers who are satellite owners, manufacturers and payload-as-a-service customers … a mix of startups flying their first satellite, customers scaling their constellation, enterprises testing their proof of concept, and companies like KSAT who are looking to fly multiple constellations with our platform,” Hamet said. “Payloads we currently help our customers operate range from telecom to Earth observation.”
Last August, Quindar reported receiving a $1.2 million contract from the Department of the Air Force’s AFWERX program to focus on automated multi-mission satellite operations. And in November, Quindar received a $250,000 grant from the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade’s Advanced Industries Accelerator Program to encourage commercialization.
