Two space-tech startups kicked off 2026’s funding news for the sector in India, aiming to expand India’s presence in the global space economy in two challenging areas. And they’ve both found backing from top-notch investors.
Ethereal Exploration Guild (EtherealX) and Aule Space Technologies revealed a Series A and a pre-seed-stage investment respectively, in separate announcements, last week.
EtherealX was founded by Manu J. Nair, Shubhayu Sardar, and Prashanth Sharma, who bring experience from ISRO and the International Institute for Astronautical Sciences to their endeavour.
They have found backing from Japan’s TDK Ventures. The venture arm of TDK Corporation will invest up to $5 million in Bengaluru-based Ethereal Exploration’s series A round.
The partnership aims to accelerate development of Razor Crest Mk-1 — the world’s first medium-lift rocket designed for full reusability, according to a press release.
EtherealX’s vehicle, still under development, targets launch costs as low as $500 per kilogram, roughly 10X lower than current rates, although the rates vary based on the type of rocket and other factors such as whether the mission is a small dedicated one or something part of large payload and so on.
At its targeted $500-$1000 range, EtherealX hopes to unlock a wide range of commercial missions, including rocket cargo as a service. Its distinguishing feature is a reusable upper stage powered by a proprietary Full Flow Segregated Cooling Cycle engine, coupled with in-house simulation and test infrastructure to shorten development cycles and improve reusability.
The global space economy is entering a phase of billion-dollar bets and trillion-dollar visions. Valued at about $630 billion in 2023, it is expected to nearly triple to $1.8 trillion by 2035, according to a McKinsey estimate, fuelled by the proliferation of satellite constellations and expanding national space ambitions.
Demand for medium-lift systems — rockets capable of carrying 2 ,000 kg to 20,000 kg of payload (to low-Earth orbits)* — is projected to grow strongly, with one forecast, by Research and Markets, estimating it grow from more than $10 billion in 2025 to nearly $16 billion by 2030, at a CAGR of about 8.5 percent. Startups from Austin to Bengaluru are racing to supply governments and private operators squeezed by bottlenecked launch capacity.
“TDK Ventures is thrilled to back the Guild in its goal to reshape the medium-lift space-launch industry,” Nicolas Sauvage, President of TDK Ventures, said in the press release. “The company aligns seamlessly with our vision for transformative innovation, excelling in slashing launch costs, pioneering novel technologies, and harnessing India’s ISRO expertise and cost-efficient supply chain.”
EtherealX’s existing investors include YourNest VC, Bluehill Capital, BIG Capital, Campus Fund, and Golden Sparrow VC. The company has already manufactured its 80kN upper-stage reusable engine (Pegasus) and has signed collaboration agreements with the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorization Centre (IN-SPACe), ISRO, and other national space agencies, as well as commercial satellite operators, launch aggregators, and launch ports globally.
Aule’s orbital jetpacks
Separately, Aule Space, also in Bengaluru, has raised pre-seed funding to build autonomous “jetpack” satellites that can dock with spacecraft that are running out of fuel and keep them going in orbit. The round totals $2 million, led by pi Ventures with participation from several angel investors, including former Intelsat board member Eash Sundaram and Tonbo Imaging chief executive Arvind Lakshmikumar.
Founded in 2024 by Jay Panchal, Nithyaa Giri and Hrishit Tambi, Aule Space is developing satellites that can safely approach, latch on to and manoeuvre other spacecraft, a class of capability known in the trade as Rendezvous, Proximity Operations and Docking (RPOD). The company will use the new capital to expand its engineering team, build ground infrastructure for docking tests and ready its first demonstration satellites, slated to launch next year.
Aule’s design combines a satellite-agnostic docking mechanism with AI-driven guidance, navigation and control algorithms, aiming to field one of the world’s lightest and most cost-efficient RPOD satellite fleets. The company is targeting use-cases from life extension of high-value geostationary communications satellites and debris removal to defence applications such as close-in inspection for space-domain awareness.
Today most satellites are abandoned once their fuel runs out, even if their payloads remain largely functional, because there is no routine in-orbit servicing infrastructure. More than 95 percent of the $100 billion generated each year in commercial satellite revenues comes from satellites in geostationary orbit (GEO) and a single satellite can generate tens to hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue, according to Joseph Anderson, a vice president at Space Logistics, a Northrup Grumman company.
“However, every year, between 10 and 20 satellites in good operating condition, and with paying customers, are shut down by their operators and replaced with expensive new satellites. This is not by choice, but by necessity: these satellites have run out of fuel,” Anderson wrote in Room, a space economy journal, in 2019.
The following year, Northop Grumman became the first company to successfully demonstrate what they called mission extension, with its MEV-1 and MEV-2 mission extension vehicles. Since then, the field has advanced and technologies that are being developed include robotic arms for in-orbit repairs, AI-based autonomous navigation, and standardized docking interfaces.
“At Aule, we are building the foundational blocks to make autonomous servicing routine,” the Bengaluru startup’s founders say on their website. “We’re kickstarting the in-space economy, supporting ISAM (in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing), space superiority, and orbital sustainability,” they say.
Backed by the Entrepreneurs First accelerator and the Transpose Platform, they say their’s is the first company in India building a life-extension solution for existing GEO satellites using “non-cooperative docking” with legacy spacecraft. (Meaning docking with spacecraft, and even debris that have no specific docking mechanisms built in, and therefore requiring autonomous navigation, advanced sensors, grappling equipment and so on.)
Only a handful of private companies globally have demonstrated such capabilities, a rarity that helped convince pi Ventures of the startup’s mix of technical depth and commercial clarity. Founding partner Manish Singhal said Aule is building “critical infrastructure” for satellite servicing, orbital sustainability and space security as it works towards operating a robotic workforce for the in-space economy.
*Note:
This episode, and the corresponding show notes here, were corrected to reflect that medium-lift rockets are widely considered to be those that can carry payloads in the range of 2,000 kg to 20,000 kg to low-Earth orbits, as per NASA’s definition. Not 2-50 tonnes, as previously mentioned.
