Six months ago, ICEYE was worth €2.4bn. Today it is worth more than €10bn. Few numbers capture Europe’s defence-tech boom as bluntly as that.
The Finnish satellite company has raised €450mn in a Series F round led by General Atlantic, valuing it at over €10bn ($11.5bn), a fourfold jump since December. Counting a secondary sale for existing shareholders, the deal totals around €1bn, one of the largest venture rounds yet for a European defence-tech firm.
New backers include Nokia, which joined as a strategic investor, the Qatar Investment Authority, TCV, and a clutch of Finnish state and pension funds.
ICEYE operates the world’s largest constellation of synthetic-aperture radar satellites, more than 70 of them, which can see through cloud, smoke, and darkness to image the ground day or night. That capability has made it indispensable in Ukraine, where its data has tracked Russian military movements since 2022, and it is now watching the Persian Gulf as Middle East demand surges.
The 💜 of EU techThe latest rumblings from the EU tech scene, a story from our wise ol' founder Boris, and some questionable AI art. It's free, every week, in your inbox. Sign up now!Founded in 2014 as an Aalto University spin-out, the company once pitched itself on climate monitoring. Defence is now the engine.
