K2 Space, a Startup Building Mega-Satellites, Raises $50 Million

(Los Angeles, California) Startup K2 Space announced today that it has raised $50 million in new funding as the company works to build “Mega-class” satellites to fit in heavy and super heavy rocket launch vehicles.

Photo of K2 Space’s co-founders and brothers Chief Executive Officer Karan Kunjur (R) and Chief Technology Officer Neel Kunjur (L) courtesy of K2 Space via TechCrunch.

The company’s latest capital raise was led by technology investor Brad Gerstner’s Altimeter Capital and joined by Alpine Space Ventures, adding to the $8.5 million in seed funding it raised from investors including First Round Capital and Republic Capital, per CNBC. K2 declined to specify its valuation after the most recent round, according to CNBC.

Almost two years since K2 Space was founded, its co-founders and brothers Chief Executive Officer Karan Kunjur and Chief Technology Officer Neel Kunjur expect to launch their first satellite on a demonstration mission later this year, according to CNBC.

Per K2 Space’s website, K2 Space “uses the full capacity of launch vehicles like F9 and Starship to break the correlation between spacecraft mass and cost.”

The website explains that K2’s next-generation satellite bus provides the ability to deploy highly capable satellites at a fraction of current costs associated with traditional satellites.

While traditional large satellites require a 48-month design cycle and cost $100M+ per satellite, given a constrained legacy supply chain of space-optimized parts, K2’s satellites require less than three months from procurement to spacecraft readiness and cost less than $15M per satellite, given a broad supply chain of commercial parts, per K2. Furthermore, while traditional satellites require significant customization per mission, K2 alleges that their satellites are truly multi-orbital and multi-mission.