The federal government’s $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund has made its third investment, tipping $25 million to lead a $50 million raise by Internet of Things (IoT) satellite builder Myriota.
It’s the first raise in four years by the Adelaide space tech startup since former PM Malcolm Turnbull was among the backers of a $28 million series B in April 2020.
Existing investor CSIRO-backed VC Main Sequence Ventures backed the latest raise along with Inter Valley Ventures.
The new funding comes with a pledge to create 100 jobs amid plans for international expansion.
Myriota’s technology involves tiny satellite transmitters that send low-powered messages directly to a constellation of low-earth-orbit nanosatellites the size of a box of tissues. Those satellites relay the messages to earth where they are decoded and sent to the end user. The technology is particularly effective in remote areas on land or at sea that do not have access to internet or cellular networks.
Its primary uses include agriculture, mining and defence, for example, low-cost monitoring of remote sensors on water tanks and other infrastructure than would normally take hours and sometimes days for farmers to drive to and check.
Other customers include US-based One-Tank’s SkyTracker, a self-contained explosion-proof tank monitor device that can be used to track consumption and detect gas leaks in propane tanks; and Australia’s RF Technologies, which is pioneering military-grade expandable sensor units for versatile applications that are designed and made in Australia.
The startup’s other investors include super fund Hostplus and CIA-backed US VC In-Q-Tel.
Myriota was part of a group of South Australia space tech companies, including SmartSat CRC and Inovor Technologies, who developed a state government-backed satellite, Kanyini, built at Lot Fourteen in Adelaide. In August the $6.5 million mission took off from the SpaceX’s Transporter-11 mission from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California
Kanyini will deliver critical space data for use by government and research institutions, in the areas of sustainability and climate impacts, including research on bushfire detection using technology that can detect fires from space 500 times faster than traditional processing.
Myriota also opened an office in the UK this year, joining teams in the US, Canada, Switzerland, Peru, Argentina and Brazil, with a Mexico office slated for early 2025.
Myriota CEO Ben Cade said investment “will support our hyper-growth and continued role as a leader in democratised satellite connectivity”, pitching the business as a telecommunications provider that’s reshaping the IoT industry.
“Agility and innovation have been at the core of Myriota since our inception, and we are leading the market in affordable, low power, scalable IoT solutions,” he said
“We strive to enable solutions that have immediate benefit from just a single, out of the box deployment on a small farm, all the way through to a large enterprise deploying tens of thousands of sensors across all their locations. This latest round will allow Myriota to further expand our services around the world.”
It’s the third investment made by the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (NRFC) in a month, following on from $40 million for a mining tech manufacturer and $13 million for synthetic diamond creator Quantum Brilliance
Meanwhile, the NRFC announced that Non-Executive Director Dr Katharine Giles has resigned from the NRFC Board, stepping down due to other work commitments.
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