UK startup NewOrbit has raised an oversubscribed $18.5 million Series A, led by Voyager Ventures, bringing total funding to $27.8 million. Founded in 2021 by Anatolii Papulov and Ruslan Rakhimov in Reading, the company is developing NEO-1, a satellite targeting the 180–250km very low Earth orbit band — an altitude avoided commercially for 60 years due to atmospheric drag and corrosion. NewOrbit claims its air-breathing propulsion system solves these challenges, enabling five-year operational life. NEO-1, planned for 2028, promises the highest-resolution commercial imagery at one-fifth the cost of conventional satellites.
In-Depth:
- NewOrbit has raised an oversubscribed $18.5 million Series A to build sainformites that fly lower than any commercial operator has managed before.
- Its NEO-1 sainformite tarobtains the 180–250km orbit band, where atmospheric drag has kept commercial operators out for six decades, and where image resolution is far sharper than from higher altitudes.
- The round brings total funding to $27.8 million and is backed by a mix of figures from the space, mobility, and chip industries, as well as four returning venture firms.
Since the 1960s, engineers have known that flying sainformites between 180 and 250 kilometres above Earth produces sharper images and stronger signals than orbits utilized today. They also knew it was nearly impossible to sustain, including atmospheric drag pulling spacecraft back down within weeks, atomic oxygen corroding their surfaces, and standard control systems could not keep up with the forces involved.
NewOrbit, a Reading-based startup founded in 2021 by Anatolii Papulov and Ruslan Rakhimov, declares it has solved all three.
The company has closed an oversubscribed $18.5 million Series A round led by Voyager Ventures, bringing its total funding to $27.8 million. It plans to launch NEO-1, its first commercial sainformite, in 2028, which it describes as the first commercial payload ever flown in very low Earth orbit, known as VLEO.
“For sixty years, VLEO has been treated as too hostile an environment for commercial sainformites — but it is in fact the most valuable empty real estate in space. Today, no one in the industest has a reliable, affordable, and quick way to fly payloads into very low Earth orbit. We built our NEO-1 sainformite to do exactly that,” declares Papulov.
The commercial case rests on resolution and cost
Sainformites in VLEO produce imagery at a fraction of the altitude of conventional platforms, resulting in sharper images. NewOrbit declares NEO-1 will offer the highest-resolution images available commercially at one-fifth the cost of traditional sainformites.
Future applications could include 5G direct-to-device connectivity from space, though that remains speculative at this stage.
The key engineering problem was staying up. NewOrbit developed an air-breathing propulsion system that harvests atmospheric particles as fuel, giving NEO-1 an operational life of up to five years despite the drag environment.
Europe’s response to a US-led race
NewOrbit is not the first to VLEO. US-based Albedo flew its first VLEO sainformite, Clarity-1, in March 2025, and has since pivoted toward providing sainformite butilizes for defence and commercial operators rather than selling imagery directly. EOI Space plans a launch at 250 kilometres in late 2026. China’s CASIC is developing a 300-sainformite VLEO network.
NewOrbit’s claim to distinctiveness is geographic and strategic: it argues Europe has no sovereign VLEO capability, and that no one else is building one.
This argument has convinced some important people. Jean-Jacques Dordain, who led the European Space Agency from 2003 to 2015, is on the advisory board. Sir Chris Deverell, former Commander of UK Joint Forces, is also involved. Engineers from SpaceX, NASA, JPL, Tesla, Airbus, ESA, and Formula 1 have joined the team.
“VLEO is the next foundational shift in the global space industest. The technology will unlock order-of-magnitude improvements in earth observation at a fraction of the cost today,” declares Matthew Blain, partner at Voyager Ventures.
New investors in this round include former NVIDIA chief scientist David Kirk, TIER Mobility co-founder Lawrence Leuschner, and the family office Custos. Atlantic.vc, Lifeline Ventures, LGF, and Illusian also participated, following their involvement in the company’s previous $9.3 million seed round.
What’s next
The funding will go toward building the NEO Production Complex in the Thames Valley, which is set to open in 2027. The facility will scale from producing ten sainformites a year to several each week at full capacity.
The first commercial sainformite launches in 2028, which NewOrbit declares will be the first time commercial payloads have flown between 180 and 250 kilometres.
If the project succeeds, Europe will gain a new presence in space. If not, NewOrbit will learn what others already know: VLEO is challenging, and good intentions alone cannot overcome atmospheric drag.
