HawkEye 360 Inc. has secured $55 million in additional funding, bringing the total raised by the firm to more than $155 million — the Series C round was led by NightDragon and included further investment from existing investors Advance, Razor’s Edge Ventures, Shield Capital, Dorilton Ventures, Adage Capital, and Esri International.
Organizations and governments are increasingly expanding their digital ecosystems and seeking to leverage new information and analysis services to gain an edge in intelligence. HawkEye 360’s platform delivers RF signal data for a broad range of actionable insights across the globe. This source of commercial and unclassified information is useful to augment national security operations, maritime domain awareness, environmental protection, and many additional applications.
The funding will support the development and launch of three additional satellite clusters, expanding the scope of HawkEye 360’s planned constellation. When fully deployed by the end of 2022, the company will have nine next generation satellite clusters in orbit. The funding will also support development of complementary ground infrastructure, communications, and software to enable high-speed data processing and delivery for time-critical applications.
HawkEye 360 is the first commercial company to use formation-flying satellites to create a new class of RF data and data analytics. The company recently commissioned the first of its next generation satellites for commercial operations. Five more clusters are already funded and are on track for launches throughout 2021 and 2022.
NightDragon, which specializes in innovative growth and late-stage companies in cybersecurity, safety, security, and privacy industries, will be represented on the HawkEye 360 Board of Directors by Founder and Managing Director Dave DeWalt.
WillmerHale acted as legal counsel for HawkEye 360 in connection with the transaction.
“Satellite technology is the next frontier in today’s digital world,” said Dave DeWalt, NightDragon Founder and Managing Director. “NightDragon is proud to invest in HawkEye 360, which leads the way in commercial RF-sensing satellites. Filling this knowledge gap will allow governments, companies, and organizations to maximize their digital ecosystems. This is about cyber meeting space, using HawkEye 360’s tools for better management and protection of critical infrastructure.”
“HawkEye 360 is grateful to have NightDragon join us as a strategic investor and we believe this fundraising is indicative of our success and substantial momentum with our customers,” said HawkEye 360 CEO John Serafini. “HawkEye 360 continues to grow rapidly and improve our constellation to meet increasing customer demand. This investment will further our goal of rapid revisit and low-latency data and data analytics, so our global customers can use this information to react quickly to pressing concerns.”
