Leanspace Announces a Second Closing of its €6m Seed Round with the Joining of Another Leading Space Investment Firm

Leanspace, the company building the digital infrastructure of the space industry, is announcing the second closing of its Seed round from earlier this year. European Space VC Herius Capital, based in Budapest, Hungary, has joined the original oversubscribed financing round of €6m ($6.4m). Herius joins existing investors Karista and 42CAP, as well as other leading organizations backing Leanspace such as Seraphim Space and Bpifrance.

With its first-of-its-kind cloud platform, Leanspace enables space organizations to leverage state-of-the-art digital technologies to manage their space missions. In an industry that still relies on software tools developed decades ago, and on heavily manual processes to move and share data, digitalization is the key stepping stone towards reaching higher operational efficiency.

Dr. Kornél Szabó Managing Partner of Herius Capital: “We are excited to join LeanSpace on its mission to digitalize the space industry via the cloud as we see modern software tools as critical enabling infrastructure for the space industry.  LeanSpace’s excellent team is building such critical software infrastructure with their deep technical and space industry experience; their vision is completely in line with Herius’ view of the future of the sector.”.

Everyone in the space industry is striving to become more agile, lower costs and deliver better service to their customers. Despite this need, many organizations still keep their data in spreadsheets, have teams work in silos and waste time analyzing information manually. The solution comes through the use of cloud-native, integrated software infrastructures and digital technologies, which allow them to drastically improve how they operate.

“In the Space industry we tend to see only the hardware part, but software is now everywhere. As Natya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, said back in 2015, ‘Every company is a software company’, explained Alvaro Alonso Ruiz, co-founder & CCO of Leanspace, “Space organizations use software to design satellites, control test benches, operate assets, derive analytics, produce and distribute products, manage customer relationships… When all your organization’s operations are fueled by software, it is undeniable that your business is a software business. The challenge space companies face is putting in place a modern and comprehensive software strategy across their entire organization.”

Leanspace enables space organizations to implement such a comprehensive software strategy, and adopt new approaches like regaining full in-house control over their software ecosystem, implementing digital continuity across tools and teams, and finding ways to abstract their engineers from the complexity of space software. The result is a drastic increase in agility and reduced costs.

With the Leanspace platform, space companies can digitalize themselves or, for new entrants, be born digital.

About Herius Capital

Herius Capital is a space industry-focused venture capital firm located in Budapest with the mission to strengthen the European NewSpace industry and leverage the growth potential of space-tech companies. As an activist investor, Herius backs the new generation of space entrepreneurs through its industry expertise and widespread network in the space sector.  

About Karista

Karista is a Venture Capital firm investing in early-stage companies in France & Europe, especially in the fields of Digital, DeepTech, Healthcare and SpaceTech. Karista has financed ventures such as Sequans Communication (NYSE Listed SQNS), Nanobiotix (Nasdaq Listed NBTX) or Comitéo (sold to Natixis). Since its inception in 2001, Karista has supported more than 100 companies in Europe and generates a sustainable performance for its investors. CosmiCapital, Karista’s SpaceTech fund, invests in the Space economy currently boosted by the growing amount of data from satellites. As a strategic partner to entrepreneurs, the Karista team is recognized for its complementary skills and unique network.

www.karista.vc

About 42CAP

42CAP are seasoned entrepreneurs turned investors. With Hybris and eCircle they previously built two of Europe’s largest B2B software companies culminating in $1.6b cash exits to SAP and Teradata respectively. The 42CAP credo Peers amongst Entrepreneurs is reflected in their investment approach, with which they support data and technology-driven business models, product-focused founders and sustainable venture development. This background is appreciated by founder personalities, such as Nicolas Reboud (SHINE, Paris), Kristjan Vilosius (Katana, Tallinn), Gregor Stühler (scoutbee, Würzburg), Ben Askew (Packlink, Madrid), Konstantin Mehl (Kaia Health, Munich) and Alex Igelsböck (Adverity, Vienna). Find more: www.42cap.com as well as https://medium.com/42cap