Mantis Space, an Albuquerque, NM-based space and advanced energy startup, raised $10 Million+ in a Seed funding round led by Rule 1 Ventures alongside Montauk Capital.
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The company plans to use the funds to expand its go-to-market team from its new headquarters in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Mantis Space, a space and advanced energy startup, is developing a constellation of spacecraft that stay in sunlight almost all the time and send power to satellites in eclipse. This system lets satellites, space stations, and orbital platforms get power through their solar arrays in real time, no matter where they are relative to the sun.
All satellites face the same basic limitation they can only generate power from direct sunlight. On average, satellites spend about one third of their time in Earth’s shadow. During these periods, they rely on batteries, which reduces performance, and limits the return on investment for each satellite.
By allowing satellites to receive power anywhere, spacecraft can stay in their most productive orbits instead of moving to catch sunlight. This increases mission use, extends operational life, and can boost the economic return of satellite systems by 2–3 times.
As satellites handle more computing and critical missions, these energy limits become more expensive. Until now, they were seen as an unavoidable part of space operations.
The Mantis Space executive team combines expertise in aerospace, defence, and precision engineering, directly suited to the challenge.
The timing comes as the space economy shifts. The first wave focused on connectivity and Earth observation. The next wave includes orbital data centres, edge computing platforms, and persistent intelligence systems that need continuous, high-density power.
The orbital economy is now worth over $600 billion and is expected to reach nearly $1 trillion by 2040. Satellites are increasingly vital for services like GPS navigation, broadband, national intelligence, climate monitoring, and global communications.
To compensate, many satellites are placed in orbits designed primarily to maximise exposure to sunlight rather than optimise mission productivity or revenue generation. The ever-popular Sun Synchronous orbits leave satellites outside of their revenue-generating and mission areas up to 70% of every day. Orbital power infrastructure changes that equation.
By letting satellites receive power anywhere, spacecraft can stay in their most productive orbits instead of moving to follow sunlight. This boosts mission use, extends their operational life, and can increase the economic return of satellite systems by 2–3 times.
The founding team includes Truitt, who recently helped BlueHalo exit to AeroVironment in a $4.5B deal and previously co-founded PredaSAR and Terran Orbital, which was acquired by Lockheed Martin. Chairman and Chief Strategy Officer Hugh Wyman Howard III served 32 years in Naval Special Warfare and joint operations, including as Director of Operations for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and currently serves on several corporate boards. COO Jeremy Scheerer has led defence and intelligence projects at MapLarge and Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) and managed a $1B+ U.S. Air Force program. All three founders are U.S. military veterans.
Mantis Space has assembled a world-class team with decades of experience bringing advanced products to market. Chief Engineer John Sandusky, PhD, recently retired after more than 20 years leading space, solar, and laser programs at Sandia National Laboratory. Director of Optical Engineering Greg Brady, PhD, helped design Apple’s Face ID and multiple camera systems and later led work on the Optical Telescope Element of the James Webb Space Telescope. Director of Electrical Engineering Quentin Diduck, PhD, previously led MicroLED development at Google (Raxium) and was Director of R&D at Eridan Communications, driving innovations in switch-mode broadband transmitters.
“Enduring companies remove systemic constraints,” said Philip Krim, Co-Founder and CEO of Montauk Capital. “Shared energy in orbit is a prerequisite for the next phase of commercial and defence expansion in space. We funded Mantis Space to create that foundation.”
“We are at the start of a space infrastructure boom,” said Eric Truitt, CEO of Mantis Space. “Launch and manufacturing have scaled, but in-orbit performance is still limited by physics. Every satellite—whether a defence sensor, broadband system, or orbital compute node—faces the same power challenge. We’re building the grid to make it all work.”
About Mantis Space
Founded by Eric Truitt, Hugh Wyman Howard III, and Jeremy Scheerer, Mantis Space is a private space technology company developing advanced infrastructure to support the next phase of commercial space activity. The company aims to make space systems deployment, operation, and scaling more efficient as the industry shifts from government-led projects to commercial growth.
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