Orbital, a Los Angeles startup, has closed a pre-seed round of $5 million led by a16z’s startup accelerator program Speedrun.
Speedrun was joined in the pre-seed round by Basis Set, Human Element, Wayfinder Ventures, Antler, Anti Fund, Ascent Venture Partners, Rubik Ventures, Zero Knowledge Ventures, LYVC, Feld Ventures, New Legacy, FNDR, UpHonest Capital, and Asterisk.
– Orbital
The company aims to launch its pathfinder demonstrator mission in 2027, which will feature an Nvidia Blackwell chip to test GPU operation, radiation tolerance, thermal performance, and data downlink. Its first full satellite, Orbital-1, is to follow in 2028, eventually paving the way for an up to 100,000-satellite constellation.
"The sun is the most abundant and accessible source of energy in the universe, yet we've barely begun to tap into it,” said Euwyn Poon, founder and CEO, Orbital, in a statement.
