Buntar Aerospace — a Ukrainian company that has developed an intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) platform and corresponding reconnaissance drone — has picked up $16 million in funding to speed up its product development, expand manufacturing capacity, and hire more talent.
Freedom Fund VC, the US investment fund founded by Uforce’s Oleg Rogynskyy that has backed some 30 defence tech startups to-date, is leading this round. Gardar, Iron Wolf and Autonomy Capital also participated.
“Surviving electronic warfare and flying autonomously, not raw endurance, will decide the next decade of tactical intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. Buntar’s vertical take-off drone, AI navigation and Copilot software layer are already proven in Ukraine, at a cost NATO can buy in volume. That’s the profile of a category leader, and we’re proud to back them,” said Iron Wolf Capital’s Managing Partner, Kasparas Jurgelionis.
The company to date has produced three products, the ISR platform Buntar Copilot; its reconnaissance drone Buntar-3 and a smaller reconnaissance flyer called the Skyhopper, and to date it has raised around $28 million, according to PitchBook data.
That includes a round from this year, when Buntar raised $10.4 million in a round led by Axon Enterprise, with participation from Munkene AS and others. It has raised a total capital raised to $30 million.
Artificial intelligence is now part and parcel of a lot of defence tech. Some question whether there should be a limit on just how much is used and where, such as, should there be a red line limiting AI use in the kill chain?Buntar comes down on the side of AI providing a clear opportunity to use it to complement humans to expand what humans can do on the battlefield.
“Every Buntar system is built to fly, sense, and adapt on its own, so skilled people can focus on decisions,” Bohdan Sas, Buntar’s cofounder, said in a statement. “We’re targeting the missions that depend most on highly trained operators: reconnaissance, counter-drone defence and precision strike assistance. That’s what Ukraine needs today, and what Europe must be ready for tomorrow. Our experience shows us that what we design today for defence has a wide range of civil applications as well, enabling us to expand our dual-use offering as well.”
