MENLO TIMES

IVEX, a deep-tech startup developing technology for automotive safety testing, led by Mario Torres and the team, has raised €5M in a Series A funding round to accelerate its engineering roadmap and expand its presence in North America and Asia. The round was backed by existing investors The Faktory and Dedicated.lu, alongside private investors. IVEX will use the funding to expand its coverage of NCAP protocols, scale its data-processing platform, and enter new automotive mark

Besxar, the exoindustrial company manufacturing advanced semiconductor materials, led by Ashley Pilipiszyn, has reported the results of Besxar Flight-1 “Mission Asimov.” On July 5, 2026, two Besxar-built “Clipper-class” canisters flew aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 first-stage booster and were recovered intact after the booster returned to land. The mission marked Besxar’s first flight carrying custom wafer cartridges, power, avionics and printed-circuit hardware designed and built

Antioch, the simulation platform for robotics and autonomy, led by Harry Mellsop, Alex Langshur, Michael Calvey, and Collin Schlager, has raised $32 million to bring software speed to physical AI development. Together with the $8.5 million seed round announced earlier this year, this brings the total funding raised to $40.5 million. Greylock General Partner Saam Motamedi joins the company's board. “Software-speed innovation in the physical world will be the foundation of the

Poseidon Aerospace, a startup focused on developing and operating unmanned cargo aircraft, led by Parker Tenney, David Zagaynov, and the team, has announced the close of an oversubscribed $60 million Series A financing. The round was led by TQ Ventures, with participation from JAWS, G Squared, Hanwha Asset Management USA, Starship Ventures, Drover Ventures, Draper Associates, and other investors. Poseidon Aerospace is developing unmanned cargo aircraft for regional commerci

BLUECORE ENERGY, a maritime nuclear energy company developing compact, water-cooled nuclear power systems, led by Kofi Asante and the team, has announced the close of a $50 million seed financing to accelerate development, testing, and deployment of its floating nuclear energy systems. The financing represents a significant expansion of Bluecore Energy’s initial $10 million pre-seed round announced when the company emerged from stealth in July. The round, led by Silverton Par

The Exploration Company, a European space company scaling globally, led by Hélène Huby, announced a $450 million Series C financing, the largest-ever Series C announced by a European space company. It also marks the largest funding round ever secured by an EU-headquartered company led by a female founder and CEO. The round is co-led by Bessemer Venture Partners, Atomico, and the Scaleup Europe Fund, managed by EQT, with participation from TEC’s existing European backers inclu

Stoke Space Technologies, Inc, the rocket company developing fully and rapidly reusable launch vehicles, led by Andy Lapsa, Tom Feldman, and the team, has announced that it has completed an initial closing of its billion-dollar Series E financing round. This funding brings Stoke’s total capital raised to $2.3 billion and will support the company as it prepares for its first orbital launch, expands production and launch capacity, and accelerates development of its larger Nova

Ground A, a German defence tech company, led by Dr. Tobias Brune, Daniel Hariri, Roland Spiegelhalder, and the team, has closed a pre-seed financing round of more than EUR 9 million in June, led by Vsquared Ventures with participation from Quantum Systems, as well as venture capital investors including GRIF, Robin Capital, ABACON, Leblon Capital and OVNI Capital. Also on board at Ground A are experienced entrepreneurs and investors from the European defence and software indus

Pixxel, the planetary infrastructure company, led by Awais Ahmed, Kshitij Khandelwal, and the team, has announced the close of its $100 million Series C funding round, co-led by Temasek and Seraphim, with participation from new investors 360 ONE Asset, IMM Investment, and existing investors Radical Ventures, growX ventures, and others. The round brings Pixxel’s total funding to $195 million. The investment also marks the single largest funding round raised by a space technolo

iPronics, a pioneer in silicon photonics-based optical circuit switching for AI infrastructure, led by Christian Dupont, Daniel Pérez-López, and the team, has announced $125 million in Series B funding co-led by Maverick Silicon and Light Street Capital. NVIDIA joined the round, with participation from new and existing investors including Triatomic Capital, Bosch Ventures, Catalight Capital, European Innovation Council Fund, The Tate Family Trust, Fine Structure Ventures, Ama

Lyte, the physical AI perception company led by Alexander Shpunt, Dr. Arman Hajati, and Dr. Yuval Gerson, has announced a $165 million Series C financing led by Maverick Silicon. The round values Lyte at $1.6 billion post-money. The round included Fidelity Management & Research Company, which led Lyte's Series B, along with Atreides Management, Key1 Capital, Ora Global (formerly Exor Ventures), and additional existing and new investors. Total capital raised since the company'

HyImpulse, a leading European launch services company developing and providing suborbital and orbital launch capabilities based on a proprietary propulsion technology, led by Dr. Christian Schmierer, Dr. Mario Kobald, Konstantin Tomilin, and Ulrich Fischer, has announced a Series A Extension financing of more than €50 million in equity, co-led by JOIN Capital and Ace Capital Partners, with participation from new investors, including North Ventures, BW-Capital, Bayern Kapital

Northwood, building a global ground network for the future of space communications, led by Bridgit Mendler, Griffin Cleverly, Shaurya Luthra, and the team, opened a new 185,000-square-foot headquarters and factory in Torrance, California, and expanded production of its satellite ground network. The new facility expands the company’s manufacturing footprint more than fivefold, from 25,000 to 135,000 square feet, enabling production of hundreds of antennas annually. The expans

Diffraqtion, an MIT and University of Maryland spinout building quantum camera platforms for defense and space sensing, led by Johannes Galatsanos, Christine Yi-Ting Wang, Saikat Guha, and the team, announced strategic investments from Lockheed Martin Ventures and Presidio Ventures, the venture arm of Sumitomo Corporation, bringing total funding to over $10M. Following strong investor interest, Diffraqtion elected to cap its pre-seed round, which also includes SBI US Gateway

Pacific Fusion, powering a prosperous planet, led by Eric Lander, Carrie von Muench, Keith Lechien, and Will Regan, has broke ground on a $1 billion Research & Manufacturing Campus in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where the company will build a fusion facility designed to achieve two first-ever milestones: net facility gain, an essential breakthrough on the path to commercial fusion power, and high-yield fusion, a critical capability for U.S. national security. The campus at Mesa

Architect Labs, an AI research lab for custom silicon, led by Ebrahim Hussain and Aaditya Subedi, has announced that its AI System generated and fully verified end-to-end from a human-written specification, a production-worthy AI accelerator called Redwood. With just two human architects providing the specifications, the AI system designed and fully verified the chip in under two weeks. It also co-designed the firmware and custom kernels and mapped modern AI models to the har

PLD Space, an international space transportation company, led by Ezequiel Sánchez, Raúl Torres, and Raúl Verdú, has been selected by the European Space Agency (ESA) under the European Launcher Challenge (ELC), a strategic initiative aimed at strengthening Europe’s autonomous, competitive, and resilient access to space. ESA’s selection of PLD Space represents a significant endorsement of the company’s technology roadmap, execution capabilities, and role within Europe’s future

REGENT Craft, the developer and manufacturer of Seaglider™ vessels, led by Billy Thalheimer and Mike Klinker, has raised $240 million, an equal mix of equity and debt, in a Series B funding round co-led by Mare Liberum and AE Ventures, with debt capital provided by Erebor Bank, marking a major milestone in REGENT's growth as it transitions from early-stage development toward full-scale manufacturing. The funding comes as REGENT approaches several major milestones, including

LeoLabs, the leading provider of persistent Orbital Intelligence, led by Tony Frazier, Daniel Ceperley, Dr. Edward Lu, and John Buonocore, has announced it has been awarded a $20.68 million Prototype Other Transaction Agreement (OTA) to support the U.S. Space Force (USSF). Under the award, LeoLabs will deliver a modified LeoLabs Scout system, providing the company the opportunity to demonstrate its proven radar technology for a new defense mission set. As threats become faste

Adaptyv Bio, the automated lab for agentic biology, led by Julian Englert and Daniel Nakhaee-Zadeh, has raised a $40M Series A from Highland Europe, Ace Ventures, byFounders, and Y Combinator. Adaptyv is building high-throughput wet-lab infrastructure to enable AI-driven biological research. The company’s work with Anthropic demonstrated a workflow in which Claude designed proteins, sent them to an automated lab, received experimental results, and iterated based on the data.

Muon Space, the Mission Foundry, designing, building, and operating high-performance satellite constellations for National Security, civil, and commercial customers, led by Jonny Dyer, Paul Day, Dan McCleese, Reuben Rohrschneider, and Pascal Stang, has announced the close of a $250 million Series C financing in a heavily oversubscribed round. The round was led by Eclipse Capital, with participation from Galvanize, Google, Salesforce Ventures, Wellington Management, I Squared

Cosmic Robotics, doing autonomous construction on Earth and beyond, led by James Emerick and Lewis Jones, has put up a roadmap to build a city on Mars. Cosmic Robotics’ mission is to enable the construction of a city on Mars. The company was founded in 2024 with the view that while rockets could enable human and cargo transport to Mars by the mid-2030s, several technologies still need to mature for a sustained human presence. One major challenge is providing the labor needed

Callosum, building the infrastructure where heterogeneous chips & intelligence co-evolve to solve the world's hardest problem, led by Jascha Achterberg, Danyal Akarca, and the team, has announced a $100M seed round to redefine how humanity computes for AI’s next chapter. The round is led by Atomico with significant participation from Plural, DCVC, and the UK Sovereign AI Fund, alongside other world-class investors and angels. AI is entering a “Cambrian explosion” of models an

ALSO, introducing transcendent mobility, led by Chris Yu and the team, has closed a $150 million Series D financing round, led by Prysm Capital, with participation from Eclipse Capital, Greenoaks, and MVP Ventures. The funding reflects confidence in the company’s product, technology roadmap, execution, and partnerships with operators including Amazon and DoorDash. The new capital will accelerate development of its autonomous vehicle platform across multiple form factors for t

Castelion, restoring America’s ability to field advanced weapons at speed and scale, led by Bryon Hargis, Sean Pitt, and Andrew Kreitz, has announced a $1 billion Series C fundraise to accelerate the scaled production of Blackbeard, Castelion’s first low-cost, mass-producible hypersonic strike missile, while expanding the company’s product portfolio to longer-range strike weapons and defensive systems. The Series C round is a combination of $800 million in equity financing an

SweGaN, which manufactures high-quality, custom-made epitaxial wafers and materials based on robust GaN technology for manufacturers of leading components and devices for satellite, communications, and defense organizations, led by Jr-Tai Chen, has announced the closing of a USD 14 million Series B round. The round was led by Swedish investor Thisbe AB, Danish venture capital firm North Ventures, and existing shareholders, underscoring continued investor confidence in SweGaN’

Terra Industries, protecting Africa’sCritical Infrastructure, led by Nathan Nwachuku and Maxwell Maduka, has raised an additional $18 million. The strategic funding closes its seed round at $52 million. Existing investors 8VC, Silent Ventures, Nova Global, Belief Capital, and SV Angel participated, alongside new investor Norleo Space Investments and angel investor Grant Gordon. Terra will use the funding to open its first international office in London, expand manufacturing c

By Philipp Herrmann, Co-founder of BRYCK and Managing Director of BRYCK Startup Alliance. This is an Op-Ed on Operators' Stack, Menlo Times. Europe has never lacked the raw material for DeepTech. It has world-class universities, deep engineering benches, and a research output that rivals the world's best. What it has lacked is the machinery to turn scientific breakthroughs into companies that can compete on a global stage. That gap between scientific excellence and commercial

Heart Aerospace, developing hybrid-electric airliners to bring commercial aviation into the electric era, led by Anders Forslund and Klara Forslund, announced the successful first flight of the company’s X1 demonstrator aircraft. Spanning 106 feet, measuring 76 feet nose to tail, and weighing more than 25,000 pounds at takeoff, X1 is the largest battery-electric aircraft ever flown. Heart’s X1 completed its first piloted flight on August 12, 2026, at the company’s flight-test

Heaviside Industries, a builder of multi-domain precision munitions platforms, announced a strategic partnership with Nammo, a global leader in ammunition, alongside a $60 million Series B financing. Felicis led the round with significant participation from Hedosophia and additional participation from Menlo Ventures, Cantos, Flume Ventures, Qstar Capital, Friends & Family Capital, Anorak Ventures, MVP Ventures, and others. Raised three months after the company emerged from st

Form Energy, an American technology company developing and commercializing a new class of cost-effective, multi-day energy storage systems led by Mateo Jaramillo and the team, has announced a $750 million Series G financing round led by T. Rowe Price, which also led the company’s prior Series F round. This round brings Form Energy’s total equity raised to date to over $2 billion. New investors joining the Series G include Sequoia Capital, Janus Henderson, Franklin Templeton,

Rocket Lab, a global leader in launch services and space systems, unveiled GHOST: a new globally deployable containerized launch system to enable suborbital and orbital launches from anywhere in the world. GHOST transforms Rocket Lab’s Electron and HASTE rockets into a mobile, launch-anywhere capability for multi-launch campaigns and national security missions. The system fits within standard shipping containers and includes rockets, launch infrastructure, ground support, an

Neros, building unmanned superiority at scale led by Soren Monroe-Anderson and Olaf Hichwa, has raised $250M Series C at a post-money valuation of $2.5B, co-led by Sequoia Capital and American Strategic Technology Fund (ASTF), with participation by Interlagos, Valor Equity Partners, Allen & Company, Thiel Capital, Spark Capital, and Dylan Field. The funding will accelerate production of Neros’ new drone programs, including Archer AI, an autonomous FPV platform, and Bandit, a

Cambridge Aerospace, the air defence company led by Steven Barrett, Chris Sylvan, and Junaid Hussain, announced the closure of its Series C round with $300M dollars of investment at a $3.4B valuation, led by DFJ Growth and supported by Lux, Accel, Lakestar, Never Lift, Ora Global, and Elad Gil & Co. The financing will support Cambridge Aerospace’s continued growth by expanding manufacturing capacity to meet existing and new contracts, while advancing current products and deve

Lumilens, the connectivity platform for AI infrastructure led by Ankur Singla, Ritesh Kapahi, Samuel Liu, Dave Friedman, Ted Schmidt, and the team, has emerged from stealth, having been founded to solve the growing networking bottlenecks limiting AI scale. In just two years after its founding, the company is commercially shipping its first product into production AI data centers under a multi-billion-dollar customer agreement, and announced more than $700 million in new fundi

Hadrian, the advanced manufacturing company building highly automated factories for America, led by Chris Power and the team, has announced $1.37 billion in new equity financing co-led by WCM Investment Management, Washington Harbour Partners, Valor Equity Partners, 137 Ventures, and Baillie Gifford. JPMorganChase's Strategic Investment Group joined as anchor co-lead, investing through the firm's Security and Resiliency Initiative, a program dedicated to strengthening the ind

Andromeda Surgical, building the intelligence layer for surgery, led by Nick Damiano and Kartik Tiwari, has raised a $15 million Series A led by Standard Capital, with participation from Y Combinator, Vox Capital, Lingotto Innovation, Alumni Ventures, WestWave Capital, and others. Pioneer Fund has backed the company twice, starting at seed. Urologists in three countries have used the company’s system to perform holmium laser enucleation of the prostate (HoLEP) in more than 40

Neuraspace, leading the way for Space Domain Awareness, AI, and Safety, led by Chiara Manfletti and the team, has announced €15.6 million in new financing, combining strategic private investment from Lince Capital, Explorer Investments, and Armilar Venture Partners together with funding awarded under Portugal's Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRRP), reflecting strong private and public confidence in the company's growth strategy. The funding will accelerate Neuraspace’s expansi

Mariana Minerals, a software-first, vertically integrated minerals company focused on supplying the minerals critical to modern energy, AI, and defense technologies, led by Turner Caldwell and the team, has announced its $310 million Series B financing, led by Khosla Ventures, with continued support from Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Breakthrough Energy Ventures, and new participation from Greenoaks, Halo Fund, Pax Ventures, StepStone Group, BHP Ventures, Washington Harbour

Valar Atomics, scaling nuclear energy for heavy industrial power and clean hydrocarbon fuel production, led by Isaiah Taylor, has announced the closing of a $1 billion Series B financing led by Sequoia Capital. As part of this new partnership, Valar welcomes Sequoia partner Shaun Maguire to Valar’s board of directors. Sequoia was joined in this round by Apandion, Atreides Management, Conviction, Dream Ventures, HOF Capital, Point72, Riot Ventures, Snowpoint Ventures, Valor Eq

Eliyan, a leader in foundational connectivity technologies enabling next-generation AI compute, memory, and networking systems, led by Ramin Farjadrad, Patrick Soheili, and Syrus Ziai, has announced it has completed its Series C with a total of $145 million at a $1 billion valuation. The oversubscribed round was led by Seligman Ventures, with participation from additional new and existing investors, including two new strategic investors: Cisco Investments and Lumentum. As par

Commonwealth Fusion Systems, the world's largest and leading commercial fusion energy company led by Bob Mumgaard, Brandon Sorbom, Steve Renter, and others, has announced that it raised $1 billion of additional equity financing. This capital raise is the single largest funding round among fusion energy companies worldwide since CFS announced its $1.8 billion Series B round in 2021. With this capital, and the $863 million the company raised last year, CFS has now raised a tota

Outlier Space, making microgravity accessible, scalable, and reliable, led by Jamie France, Nick Pearson, and Alex Linossier, has raised a $7M pre-seed fundraise to develop a commercial microgravity payload capsule, led by GD1 (Global from Day One), with participation from Nova Threshold, Brian Cartmell, Airtree, Icehouse Ventures, Investible, and Side Stage Ventures. One of the largest pre-seed funding rounds in New Zealand's history, the investment underscores the country's

Xeltis, addressing major life-threatening diseases, backed by Nobel-winning science, led by Eliane Schutte and the team, has raised an additional €20.5M of new funding from new and existing shareholders. Participating investors included the European Innovation Council, Invest-NL, VI Partners, EQT Life Sciences, DaVita and other current shareholders, alongside Horizon 3 Healthcare, a new investor who led the round. The additional financing, alongside the €50 million secured in

Array Labs, designing, building, and operating the world’s most advanced radar satellites, led by Andrew Peterson and Jose Isaac Robledo, has raised $21 million in an oversubscribed strategic investment round, anchored by Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, one of Japan's largest defense and aerospace companies, with continued participation from Catapult Ventures, Kompas VC, and Y Combinator. As part of the financing, Array Labs and Mitsubishi Electric have entered into a partne

ZuriQ, a Swiss quantum computing company spun out of ETH Zürich, led by Dr. Pavel Hrmo, Dr. Shreyans Jain, and Dr. Tobias Sägesser, has raised $25.5 million in seed funding to scale its trapped-ion quantum processors. The round builds on the company’s $4.2 million pre-seed round in 2025 and is led by Quantonation, with participation from Forward.one, Extantia, Firgun Ventures, and all previous round investors. The new funding will help ZuriQ expand its team, accelerate resea

Antares, building compact nuclear microreactors to deliver reliable, mobile energy where it’s needed most: remote military bases, austere industrial sites, and, one day, deep space and underwater missions, led by Jordan Bramble and the team, has raised $470 million in Series C funding, co-led by Paradigm and Caffeinated Capital, with participation from Point72 Ventures, Shine Capital, Industrious Ventures, and others. The funding will accelerate Antares’ transition from a pro

Limitless Labs, the world’s first Agentic Physical AI platform for CAD/CAM (Computer-Aided Design and Computer-Aided Manufacturing) in mechanical manufacturing, led by David Priev, Shahaf Finder, Assaf Peleg, and the team, has raised a $20 million Series A round co-led by Dell Technologies Capital and Square Peg, with participation from Grove Ventures, Meron Capital, and Kinetica. The AI agent integrates directly into existing CAD/CAM systems, enabling manufacturers to captur

Science Corp, a clinical-stage medical technology company led by Max Hodak and the team, has announced the European commercial launch of PRIMA, the first and only treatment shown in clinical trials to restore functional central vision to patients with geographic atrophy (GA) caused by age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a leading cause of blindness. PRIMA has received a CE (Conformité Européenne) mark under the European Union Medical Device Regulation from DEKRA, authoriz

Atoms, building physical automation to transform industry and move the world, led by Travis Kalanick, has announced a $1.7B equity investment with lead investor a16z and Ben Horowitz joining the board. As part of this investment, the various businesses were consolidated into a single Atoms equity structure. Marc and Ben have shared a long-standing relationship, and a partnership at Uber came remarkably close in 2011. Responsibility for the missed opportunity has long been deb