Skye Air Mobility raises USD 1.7 million, led by Chiratae Ventures

Skye Air Mobility, India's leading drone delivery technology company, has announced the successful completion of its USD 1.7 million Seed Round, which was organized by Chiratae Ventures, Lead Angels, O2 Angels, Agility Ventures, Lets Venture, and a number of notable investors, including Rajeev Chitrabhanu, Ankit Nagori, Varun Alagh, Gautam Badalia, Ayush Lohia, and others, also participated in the round.

The investment will be used to bring greater efficiency to different verticals by allowing faster deliveries, reduction in carbon emission, reduced cost, and increased accessibility to locations that are difficult to reach by road or where there is no connectivity at all. Businesses across various industries have begun to see the benefits of incorporating drones into their operations, such as cost savings, time savings, and technological breakthroughs.

India is an attractive market for drone start-ups as the country is very progressive with respect to the integration of drones into everyday life. 2021 has been a promising year for UAVs as it created an optimistic environment with the introduction of new drone rules and PLI scheme. The Indian drone delivery industry's potential stands at USD 18 Billion (in first and last-mile segments) and is further growing at an exceptional growth rate.

"This investment comes when we are intensifying our efforts to expand our services and collaborations in the Indian market. We are convinced that the new funding will facilitate our team to open untouched channels, allowing us to bring drone delivery services to more customers in India and beyond. We also believe the investment, which is so far the largest in the delivery focused drone segment, is testament to the fact that Skye Air is leading the way of drone delivery technology in the country with its proprietary SaaS technology.

"It is also noteworthy to mention, At Skye Air, our core aim is to enable change, bring the much-needed disruption in the first & last mile logistics industry to move faster and more efficiently. Skye Air is proactively working in the healthcare, quick commerce and eCommerce verticals enabling solutions for faster and cost-effective deliveries, and with the new round of funding we aim to make drone delivery as a mainstream solution.", said Ankit Kumar, CEO, Skye Air Mobility.

We are excited to partner with Skye Air Mobility to disrupt the first & last mile logistics in an efficient and climate-friendly manner, beginning with the Healthcare domain and expanding into other sectors with its logistics and SaaS solutions" said Mandeep Julka, Vice President - Investments, Chiratae Ventures.

"Only a handful of companies in the much-hyped drone ecosystem actually have a robust scalable solution and necessary domain knowledge. We saw that Skye Air was exceptional on both these accounts, and which drove our investment decision," said Sushanto Mitra, CEO & Founder, Lead Angels

"O2 Angel Network, investment bankers backed a Deep-Tech focused angel network, identified Skye Air as a category creator within the drone ecosystem. We were impressed with team domain knowledge and experience. Thus, O2 Angel found Skye Air to be a perfect partner for its new age Angel investors with the visionary founders," said Rajesh Ranjan, Founder, O2 Angel Network.

"Drone delivery is increasingly gaining ground across logistics providers to tackle inefficiencies in last mile delivery and is expected to grow at more than 50% CAGR over the next six years. We believe Skye Air has a head start in the same and is poised to be a leader in the industry" said Dhianu Das, Founder, Agility Ventures.

With the addition of multiple new clients and collaboration with State Governments to promote the business, Skye Air has experienced tremendous growth over the past few months. Currently operating in 8 locations throughout the nation, the organisation hopes to reach 16 cities in the next 2 years.