Solestial, Inc. (“Solestial”) has closed a $17 million Series A funding round led by AE Ventures.
The round welcomed new investors Crosscut Ventures, Zeon Ventures, and Mitsubishi Electric Corporation’s ME Innovation Fund (general partner: Global Brain Corporation), with participation from existing investors Airbus Ventures, General Purpose Venture Capital, Industrious Ventures, Stellar Ventures, and Techstars.
The Series A funding enables Solestial to continue scaling its manufacturing capacity of silicon photovoltaics to 1 megawatt per year, a rate comparable to the estimated annual manufacturing capacity of all U.S. and EU III-V space solar companies combined.
In addition to this funding, Solestial also announced the appointment of Margo de Naray as Chief Executive Officer. De Naray, formerly Senior VP & GM of Space Products and Services at Astra, brings 20 years of extensive commercial and operations management experience in growth and high-tech environments. Founding CEO, Stanislau Herasimenka, will assume the role of Chief Technology Officer to focus on advancing the company’s product roadmap and rapidly scaling operations technology.
Solestial offers spacecraft manufacturers the ability to significantly reduce cost and weight without sacrificing energy needs or performance. With strong customer demand, Solestial has prioritized scaling production. Since opening its Tempe, Arizona, manufacturing facility in 2023, the company has added square footage each year, more than doubled its workforce, and delivered commercial products to dozens of companies.
About Solestial
Solestial exists to deliver abundant energy in space. The company’s breakthrough technology is a silicon solar cell engineered for space to self-cure radiation damage under sunlight at operating temperatures as low as 65°C. Solestial solar cells are packaged in an ultrathin, low-mass, flexible solar power module designed to withstand up to 10 years in a variety of destinations in space. The flexible solar power modules can be produced on automated machines resulting in costs lower than traditional III-V multijunction solar products.