The rare “series D” funding round is a dramatic increase from the $5 million, $35 million and $50 million brought in through its A, B and C rounds, respectively.
The latest cash injection was led by a Canadian teachers pension fund alongside previous investors such as Blackbird Ventures, Hostplus and Horizons Ventures.
“This funding is not just a testament to Fleet Space’s growth, strong investor confidence, and sustained innovation in core technologies needed to address dual challenges of climate change and mineral exploration,” said Federico Tata Nardini, Fleet’s chief financial officer.
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The company’s extraordinary rise has been led by its satellites that can detect minerals underground from space. The technology effectively allows mining companies to both speed up the hunt for minerals and reduce costs by lowering the need for invasive land surveying.
“ExoSphere” has led Fleet to be named one of Australia’s fastest-growing companies, boasting clients such as Rio Tinto, Barrick Gold, and Core Lithium.
It has recently expanded its global footprint to include the US, Canada, Chile, and Luxembourg and now employs more than 130 people.
“Current mineral exploration methods are inadequate for efficient discovery and production,” said Rick Prostko from investor Teachers’ Venture Growth.
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“Fleet Space addresses this with advanced 3D subsurface imaging and AI analysis tools, which have the potential to sustainably transform the industry.”
The news comes after Fleet in April blasted off a next-generation Centauri-6 satellite that uses advanced sensors to scan beneath the Earth’s surface.
Fleet co-founder Flavia Tata Nardini hailed it as a “portal into a future of efficient, mass-scale satellite manufacturing”.
“Humanity’s expanding satellite infrastructure is rapidly unlocking new capabilities that can help to address some of the most pressing challenges facing our planet,” she said.
“At current rates of mineral discoveries and production, our net-zero goals and clean energy future are unattainable in the coming decades.”
Aside from mineral detecting, the firm, which specialises in nanosatellites, is also creating a device known as SPIDER that could detect minerals on the moon’s south pole.
The SPIDER project – Seismic Payload for Interplanetary Discovery, Exploration and Research – will see Fleet build a three-component seismic station that can record continuous seismic data for up to 14 days. It’s set to be deployed in 2026.
“The convergence of innovation in space, AI, and 3D subsurface imaging represents a foundational pillar of the core technology set that will enable humanity to build permanent research stations on the moon, Mars, and beyond,” said Matt Pearson, Fleet’s chief exploration officer.
“The flywheel we’ve created, by continuously enhancing the subsurface understanding of Earth through the global deployment of ExoSphere simultaneously, drives advances in the technology needed to build highly scalable, data-driven exploration systems for new worlds.”
Adam Thorn
Adam is a journalist who has worked for more than 40 prestigious media brands in the UK and Australia. Since 2005, his varied career has included stints as a reporter, copy editor, feature writer and editor for publications as diverse as Fleet Street newspaper The Sunday Times, fashion bible Jones, media and marketing website Mumbrella as well as lifestyle magazines such as GQ, Woman’s Weekly, Men’s Health and Loaded. He joined Momentum Media in early 2020 and currently writes for Australian Aviation and World of Aviation.
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