Singapore drone services player gets $26m Series B
H3 Dynamics, a Singapore-based autonomous drone data services and hydrogen air logistics start-up, has raised a $26 million Series B round led by Japan’s Sparx Asset Management.
Sparx is investing via its Mirai Creation Fund, a JPY13.5 billion ($117.7 million) fund, established in 2018 with Toyota Motor Corporation and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation.
Singapore’s EDBI, Grosvenor Group, Audacy Ventures, Capital Management Group, and Ascent Hydrogen Fund also participated. They were joined by France’s ATEQ, a company that makes electronic measurement equipment.
H3 Dynamics was founded in 2015 by Taras Wankewycz, who has been working in the area of hydrogen-powered flight since 2006 with the likes of NASA. The idea is to bring longer range and flight-duration hydrogen electric propulsion alternatives to a nascent battery-electric aviation market.
The company began by building autonomous charging infrastructure for battery drones and offering various maintenance and monitoring services to. The plan is to use this infrastructure to support much longer-range, unmanned systems, capable of flying for hours using hydrogen technology – and thus opening up autonomous, zero-emissions cargo.
Wankewycz believes that due to safety challenges, hydrogen technology will not fly passengers commercially for at least the next 10 years. “Before carrying people, we will carry freight, and before carrying tons, we will carry kilos,” he said in a statement. “Commercialization will start with unmanned platforms first.”
H3 has built and commercialized a proprietary, all-digital inspection and rectification automation software, starting with smart-city applications such as high-rise façade maintenance. This service is now said to be a market leader in Southeast Asia.
There are also plans to release an autonomous drone nesting station, designed to help drone pilots navigate Asian cities densely packed with tall buildings. These cloud-connected “vertiports” would be set up on rooftops or industrial sites, allowing drones to send data through 5G and become visible in real time in the national airspace.
“Air mobility is one of the hardest, yet most important industries to decarbonize. H3 Dynamics is ideally placed to overcome this challenge,” David Wu, president of Ascent, added.
“It is already generating revenue with a clear path to profit using a scalable software-as-a-service model, while also benefiting from two decades of ultra-light hydrogen fuel cell system development. Thanks to its unique approach and its strong ecosystem across industries and geographies, we believe H3 Dynamics is best positioned to scale its solutions and outgrow the market.”
More on Southeast Asia
Latest News
Asian GPs slow implementation of ESG policies - survey
Asia-based private equity firms are assigning more dedicated resources to environment, social, and governance (ESG) programmes, but policy changes have slowed in the past 12 months, in part due to concerns raised internally and by LPs, according to a...
Singapore fintech start-up LXA gets $10m seed round
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has led a USD 10m seed round for Singapore’s LXA, a financial technology start-up launched by a former Asia senior executive at The Blackstone Group.
India's InCred announces $60m round, claims unicorn status
Indian non-bank lender InCred Financial Services said it has received INR 5bn (USD 60m) at a valuation of at least USD 1bn from unnamed investors including “a global private equity fund.”
Insight leads $50m round for Australia's Roller
Insight Partners has led a USD 50m round for Australia’s Roller, a venue management software provider specializing in family fun parks.