Atmos Space recently announced having an investment deal with Cantos Ventures, raising an estimated $5Mn total capital during 2021. Cantos has also disclosed joining this round with another undisclosed aerospace investor for realizing space mobility and logistics.
Atomos Space, based in Denver Colorado, is operating upon manufacturing orbital transfer vehicles (OTVs) for aiding in the Satellite operators for getting their position in space. Atomos has been founded by Vanessa Clark and William Kowalski in late 2017, as the firm has won as well as executed in excess of over $2Mn in contracts with NASA, the US Air Force, and US Space Force.
According to Atomos Space reports, it has over $200M of customer interest for in-space mobility. Atomos co-founder and COO, William Kowalski commented: “Some customers need to procure multiple dedicated launches to deploy their constellation. Our services halve their launch costs.”
According to Atomos announcement, the barrier to entry for satellites to get to space has decreased significantly, many applications require orbits unavailable to satellite ridesharing with a larger payload.
Enter Atomos\’ OTVs. By capturing client satellites and transporting them to their target operational orbit, Atomos solves the last-mile problem in space at a fraction of the cost of a dedicated launch.
Vanessa Clark, CEO, and co-founder of Atomos stated: “Atomos\’ advantage is their technical approach. Unlike similar systems under development, their OTVs reside in space and rendezvous with client satellites on orbit, allowing more launch mass and volume for the payload and amortizing costs over many missions during the OTV\’s lifetime.”
Vanessa added: “Atomos is focused on highly scalable, high-power electric and nuclear propulsion. Current propulsion technologies are evolutionary dead ends and can\’t scale into the future space economy. Our propulsion moves us in a new direction.”
Cantos Ventures Founder & Managing Partner, Ian Rountree stated: “We see a massive need for companies like Atomos. We think of them as orbital Uber. Their money is on Atomos because \”we believe in the Atomos team and see their service and underlying technologies – like nuclear propulsion – as vital to our future.”
Since the 2021 investment, Atomos has doubled the size of their team and successfully completed ground testing of their autonomous rendezvous and docking technology and integrated propulsion system. Atomos expects to launch its first two spacecraft, Quark, and Gluon, in 2023, and is excited to continue to expand the reach of humanity.
