Star Catcher Closes $12.25M Seed Round to Transform Space Operations With World's First Space-Based Energy Grid

All-Star Team of Space Veterans Plan to Launch an Orbital Demonstration in Late 2025

JACKSONVILLE, Fla., July 24, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Star Catcher Industries, Inc. ("Star Catcher", the "Company"), the pioneer in space-based energy generation, today announced the closing of its $12.25M seed round. Initialized Capital and B Capital co-led the round, with meaningful participation from Rogue VC. With this funding, the Company is positioned to help eliminate power constraints on space operations through the construction of its Star Catcher Network, the world's first space-based energy grid.

Once constructed, the Star Catcher Network will be a first-of-its-kind energy grid able to beam significant levels of broad spectrum energy to spacecraft in Low Earth Orbit ("LEO") and beyond. The network will deliver energy on demand and at higher concentrations of energy than the Sun to the existing solar arrays of client spacecraft enabling them to generate up to five to ten times the amount of power they would generate otherwise without retrofit.

Demand for high-performing, power-intensive applications in space, including space-based telecommunications, on orbit computing, remote sensing, human spaceflight, and national security applications, is growing exponentially. With LEO projected to host more than 40,000 satellites by 2030, Star Catcher anticipates a need for 840 megawatts of power generation to operate these systems, compared to the tens of megawatts of power generation capacity in space today. By providing spacecraft with higher concentrations of energy to state-of-the-art solar arrays, the Star Catcher Network will significantly magnify space-based power generation to meet this growing demand and enable satellite operators to expand capabilities and uptime while reducing upfront spend.

Star Catcher was founded by longtime space entrepreneurs Andrew Rush and Michael Snyder, alongside experienced VC investor and operator Bryan Lyandvert. 

• Andrew Rush previously served as CEO & President of in-space manufacturing trailblazer Made In Space, where he led the company through its successful sale to Redwire Corporation in 2020. Following the sale, Rush became Redwire's founding President & COO, where he managed hundreds of millions of dollars of development and delivery contracts for commercial, civil, and national security customers. He has spearheaded programs and initiatives that include replacing solar arrays on the International Space Station, delivering multiple shipsets of solar arrays and spacecraft navigation components for national security customers, and developing and delivering camera systems for the Artemis I mission.
• Michael Snyder served alongside Rush as co-founder and Chief Engineer of Made In Space and Chief Technology Officer of Redwire. One of the most accomplished space technologists of the modern era, Snyder has flown over a dozen payloads to space and holds more than 50 patents on a wide variety of cutting-edge space technologies. Snyder is the 2022 recipient of the AIAA Lawrence Sperry Award for notable contributions made to the aerospace industry.
• Bryan Lyandvert is a well-known space investor with extensive experience in early stage investing and capital formation from his time at MetaProp Ventures and T-Bird Capital. Earlier in his career, Lyandvert worked at Amazon, managing a multi-hundred-million-dollar wearables and emerging technology P&L.

"Power infrastructure is the foundational building block of civilization and industry; our goal is to expand that foundation into LEO and beyond with our in-space power grid and service," said Andrew Rush, Co-Founder, President, and CEO of Star Catcher. "Being able to buy power for your spacecraft whenever and wherever you need it in LEO will expand opportunity and accelerate humanity realizing the potential of the second golden age of space."

Star Catcher has made significant technical progress in developing its constellation and has achieved early traction, securing more than half a dozen letters of intent from commercial space companies spanning the remote sensing, national security, human habitat, and telecommunications verticals.

"Most any maturing sector requires solid, dependable, ubiquitous infrastructure to really take off. We're confident Star Catcher will do for orbital power what SpaceX has done for launch. They're a proven, veteran commercial space team executing on an audacious vision at high speed. What they're building has the potential to transform the economics, capabilities, and even configuration of most everything we put into orbit," says Andrew Sather, Principal at Initialized Capital.

"As a longtime space sector investor, I view the network Star Catcher is developing as one of the most potentially transformational technologies in the dynamic and continuously evolving space technology sector. Satellite launch costs continue to fall, and power needs are accelerating with onboard processing. At the same time, energy demand is vastly outstripping the supply that current solar panels and batteries provide. Star Catcher's founders are drawing from their extensive industry experience to tackle this opportunity with a unique approach. At B Capital, we support pioneering founders and companies shaping our future through technology and are confident Star Catcher has the vision, roadmap, and team to build the core infrastructure that will power and reshape the future space economy," says Howard Morgan, Chair and General Partner of B Capital.

With this seed funding, Star Catcher's immediate focus will be on validating and demonstrating its power beaming services for customers, beginning with ground demonstrations, followed by an on-orbit demonstration in late 2025, and deployment of commercial service. Once deployed, satellite operators can shift to a shared infrastructure mindset, where power consumption will not be constrained by what satellites bring with them.

About Star Catcher
Star Catcher Industries, Inc. (Star Catcher) was founded in 2024 by multiple time successful space entrepreneurs Andrew Rush and Michael Snyder and experienced VC and operator Bryan Lyandvert to eliminate power constraints on satellites and other spacecraft by constructing the Star Catcher Network: the world's first space-based energy grid. Star Catcher's proprietary power beaming technology will beam power to other satellites in space as a service, enabling client spacecraft to use their existing solar arrays to receive more power, more consistent power, and higher concentrations of power in order to increase capability and uptime as well as reduce upfront spending and overall mission cost.

For more information, please visit www.star-catcher.com

About Initialized Capital
Initialized Capital is an early-stage venture firm that invests with conviction before it's obvious. We're a diverse group of founders, builders, and operators who understand how hard it is to build a company. We back visionaries using software to make civilization better and support them through product-market fit and beyond. We're early believers in companies like Coinbase, Instacart, Flexport, and Cruise. Initialized's portfolio—which spans over six core funds —is worth close to $200 billion in market value with 25 companies valued at $1 billion or more and 5 valued over $10 billion.

About B Capital
B Capital invests globally in extraordinary founders and businesses shaping the future through technology. With more than $7 billion in assets under management and dedicated stage-based funds, the firm focuses on seed to early- and late-stage venture growth investments, primarily in the technology, healthcare and climate sectors. Founded in 2015, B Capital has an integrated, global team across eight locations in the U.S. and Asia. The firm's value-add platform, together with the consulting expertise of its strategic partner, The Boston Consulting Group, provides entrepreneurs with the tools and resources to scale quickly and efficiently, expand into new markets and build market-leading businesses. For more information, click here.

Media Contacts
Star Catcher
[email protected]

Initialized Capital
Daniel Sherman
[email protected]

B Capital
Kate Thompson / Tim Ragones / Madeline Jones
Joele Frank, Wilkinson Brimmer Katcher
212-355-4449

SOURCE Star Catcher Industries, Inc.