Prepares for first European in-orbit refuelling mission “ASTRAL” in 2028
Vilnius, Lithuania, 30 September 2026 – Lithuania’s Blackswan Space, has successfully closed its second investment round, led by Iron Wolf Capital, raising €2.5 million ($2.9M). Together with the company’s pre-seed round, its total funding now amounts to €3.2M ($3.7M).
Other investors included Lemonade Stand and former NanoAvionics co-founder Linas Sargautis – all previous investors of Blackswan – as well as NGL Ventures and Tomas Žalandauskas who also founded multiple successful high-tech companies in Lithuania.
While Blackswan’s pre-seed round allowed it to commercialise its Mission Design Simulator (MDS), capable of modelling complex autonomous mission execution, and secure multiple commercial customers in both EU and US including Auria Space, this latest funding enables Blackswan to accelerate the commercialisation of its rendezvous & proximity operations (RPO) system, the “RPO Kit”, and further the company’s expansion in the USA.
The RPO-Kit is a plug-and-play spacecraft payload, using Blackswan’s proprietary Vision-Based Navigation (VBN) system. It gives operators the technology to perform complex autonomous navigation manoeuvres in space. The company has been developing its VBN system for the past five years.
As the next major milestone on the way to commercialise the system, Blackswan will be testing its RPO Kit in orbit next year. The launch is scheduled for Q4 in 2027. This will be followed by the first European in-space refuelling mission “ASTRAL” (Advance Satcom Technology with Refuelling and Logistics), planned for 2028. ASTRAL is led by in-orbit logistics company Orbit Fab with Blackswan’s RPO Kit playing a critical part by enabling the docking of the two spacecraft and the subsequent refuelling operation. ASTRAL is backed by up to €3.3m ($3.8 million) in funding from the UK Space Agency and the European Space Agency (ESA).
Jake Geer, managing director Orbit Fab UK, said: “This team has proven themselves to be highly capable and driven from the very beginning. That and their strong relationship with ESA is why we selected Blackswan to provide one of the most critical components – the RPO Kit – for our upcoming first European refuelling demonstration mission “ASTRAL”, flying in 2028.”
Viktoras Jucikas, founding partner at Iron Wolf Capital, said: “A satellite in orbit today is blind and deaf without the ground. It cannot tell what has parked next to it, cannot avoid a collision on its own, and cannot be easily repaired or refuelled. Blackswan Space is working to change that. Its navigation payload gives spacecrafts their own eyes and the intelligence to manoeuvre relative to another object. At Iron Wolf Capital, we back the technologies Europe cannot afford to depend on third-countries to provide, and we back them early. Autonomy in orbit is one of them, and Blackswan is building it.”
Marius Klimavičius, CEO of Blackswan, said: “We are very excited to have closed our latest investment round. I am particularly proud that all our current investors are local, coming from Lithuania and Estonia. This is no small feat for a company like Blackswan Space, considering that pockets were never that deep for space startups in our region. This achievement is testament to the work and effort that went into developing our unique technology as well as growing the business to stack up and succeed even against much bigger players.
“The current seed round coupled with our recurring commercial revenues and secured institutional projects will help significantly grow Blackswan’s business, scaling MDS sales and helping us test the RPO Kit in orbit sooner. This in turn allows us to address the growing market demand for autonomous operations in space with both of our products.
“Making satellites autonomous is a huge challenge and has been our main goal from the very beginning. Blackswan has been consistently moving towards that goal over the past seven years, building credibility among our key technology partners, like ESA, and attracting commercial customers in both Europe and the USA. With the help of our technology partners, we have been going through rigorous testing campaigns to prove the efficacy of our approach for our simulations and VBN technologies, used in our Mission Design Simulator and our RPO-Kit. Right now, our focus is to fully prove our current technology performs in space, allowing us to go after some very exciting new market opportunities.”
Linas Sargautis, investor and former CCO of NanoAvionics, said: “Having been part of the satellite manufacturing industry for over a decade, I’m excited to support young companies that represent the next step in space technologies. And Blackswan Space perfectly fits that bill. Blackswan Space’s RPO Kit is an enabling technology for space logistics activities for both civil and defence applications, for autonomous satellite operations, and for orbital manoeuvering and Orbital Transfer Vehicles (OTVs) carrying out In-Orbit Servicing (IOS). The IOS market in particular is growing rapidly, and what was once a niche segment is projected to exceed €10 billion in market value by 2035.
– ENDS –
Note to editors
About Iron Wolf Capital
Iron Wolf Capital is a leading European venture capital firm focused on backing globally ambitious startups in the Baltic Sea region and Ukraine at the forefront of deep tech, artificial intelligence, and defence, sovereignty, and resilience. The firm is one of the most active defence tech investors in Europe, supporting mission-driven founders who are developing next-generation technologies in areas such as cybersecurity, space technology, photonics, autonomy, and more.
About Blackswan Space
Founded in 2019, Blackswan Space has been developing its innovative Mission Design Simulator (MDS) software for next-gen autonomous space missions, and its RPO Kit, a plug-and-play spacecraft payload designed to autonomously perform complex navigation manoeuvres, leveraging advanced vision-based target detection, identification and tracking. Blackswan has successfully grown its business from two technical experts to what is now a dedicated team of 25 people spread across Vilnius (Lithuania), London (UK) and Denver (Colorado, USA).
As the number of satellites in orbit is growing rapidly, Blackswan’s technology stack is becoming more and more relevant, enabling space mission operators to perform autonomous asset inspection and servicing as well as collision avoidance and operations management without having to build these complex technologies in house.
For more information, please visit our website at www.blackswanspace.com.
