PAVE Space, a Swiss space
infrastructure company, has raised $40 million in seed funding to develop a new
generation of spacecraft designed to move satellites rapidly between orbits.
The round was led by Visionaries Club and Creandum, with participation from
Lombard Odier Investment Managers, Atlantic Labs, Sistafund, b2venture, ACE
Investment Partners, Ilavaska Vuillermoz Capital, and Pareto & Motier
Ventures.
The company is building a
family of orbital transfer vehicles (OTVs) capable of transporting satellites
from low Earth orbit to higher-energy destinations such as geostationary and
lunar orbits in under 24 hours, addressing a growing bottleneck in the space
economy. Today, satellites typically rely on onboard propulsion systems that
can take months to reach their final orbit, delaying operations and increasing
costs.
PAVE’s flagship kickstage
vehicle is designed to shorten mission timelines and reduce costs using
storable bipropellants, while a smaller mobile platform is being developed for
rapid, flexible satellite repositioning.
As the number of
satellites in orbit continues to grow, demand for faster and more flexible
orbital mobility is increasing across both commercial and institutional
markets. PAVE aims to provide a launcher-agnostic logistics layer compatible
with multiple launch systems, supporting satellite operators, telecom providers
and defence organisations.
Julie Böhning, CEO and
co-founder of PAVE Space, said that the space economy is moving into an
industrial phase where logistics in orbit will become as essential as they are
on Earth:
Our ambition is to build
the infrastructure that enables industries to move, operate and scale beyond
Earth, while supporting Europe’s strategic autonomy in space.
The company is preparing
its first in-space demonstration mission and has already secured early
reservation agreements with satellite operators.
The funding will be used
to accelerate development of its orbital logistics platforms, conduct initial
demonstration missions, expand its engineering team and prepare for its first
commercial deployments.