The San Leandro, California-based Grid Aero announced a $20 million Series A co led by Bison Ventures and Geodesic Capital, with participation from Stony Lonesome Group, Alumni Ventures, and returning investors Ubiquity Ventures, Calibrate Ventures, and Commonweal Ventures. The round comes just over a year after the company was founded.
Grid Aero is building large autonomous cargo aircraft designed to operate from difficult locations. The company’s focus is not speed or elegance but range, payload, and cost. Their Lifter Lite aircraft is intended to carry thousands of pounds over long distances at a fraction of the cost of traditional logistics platforms. The goal is to create aircraft that can be deployed forward, operated at scale, and maintained without the infrastructure that legacy systems depend on.
“We’re focused on solving major problems for the warfighter, starting with contested logistics,” said Arthur Dubois, CEO of Grid Aero. “Those same challenges of range, resilience, and operating in constrained environments also define many commercial, humanitarian, and remote operations. This funding allows us to rapidly field autonomous aircraft to deliver scalable capability into real-world operations to meet growing demand across missions.”
They plan to use the new funding to move Lifter Lite into operational use while supporting exercises and early deployments. They will also be moving from prototype to final product this year, an impressive move for an 18-month-old company.
“What Grid Aero has accomplished in less than 18 months is rare,” said Ben Hemani, Founding Partner at Bison Ventures. “Not only have they already built their flagship aircraft, but they are also building a logistics capability that operates where traditional systems can’t. We’re excited to fund the next phase of their growth, as they move from rapid development to real-world scale.”
