Yahoo Finance Astranis is set to build Omega constellation after $200M Series D
Astranis has fully funded its next-generation satellite program, called Omega, after closing its $200 million Series D round, the company said Wednesday.
“This next satellite is really the milestone into the next frontier for Astranis,” Megan Sapack, Astranis’ avionics lead, said in a video.
Astranis develops and operates small broadband communications satellites in geostationary orbit. It has launched several of its first-generation satellites, called MicroGEOs, and sells the capacity to local telecoms in countries including the United States, the Philippines, and Mexico. It unveiled its next-generation Omega satellites in April, which the company says will provide five times the bandwidth capacity in a similarly small form factor.
The team was able to do this by reducing the amount of power per beam and designing a new, larger reflector. The reflector is folded into a small volume during launch and unfolded on orbit to around the size of a boxing ring. The new spacecraft also includes improved mechanical, thermal and avionics system performance, as well as a longer total lifetime on orbit.
The first Omega will launch in 2026. Each spacecraft will have a 10-year operational life.
Astranis aims to manufacture 24 satellites per year in 2025, a scale that has not been seen before for spacecraft operating in geostationary orbit. While companies like SpaceX manufacture hundreds of spacecraft per year, those satellites operate in low Earth orbit; for geostationary satellite operators, the pace of manufacturing is typically on the order of a single satellite over many years, due to the increased power and size demands. Astranis' pace has been enabled by the company bringing around 70% of the manufacturing component in-house.
“Since moving into this new facility, we’ve taken a huge focus on taking the arts and crafts out of satellite manufacturing and transitioning it towards design for manufacturing at a mass scale,” Astranis engineer Payton Case said.
Astranis plans to have over 100 spacecraft operating on orbit by 2030.
The round was led by long-time Astranis investor Andreessen Horowitz's Growth Fund, co-led by BAM Elevate, a growth-stage investor backed by investment firm Balyasny Asset Management, with participation from BlackRock, Fidelity, and Baillie Gifford.
