---
title: "Drone Security Company Raises $20M to Down Drones—Using Drones"
description: "The drone tech company that uses net-launching UAVs to capture rogue drones has new funding to refine its autonomous drone-identifying software."
date: "2018-03-14"
modified: "2019-06-19"
authors:
  - name: "Marco Margaritoff"
    link: "https://www.thedrive.com/authors/marco-margaritoff"
url: "https://www.thedrive.com/tech/19187/drone-security-company-raises-20m-to-down-drones-using-drones"
categories:
  - "News"
tags:
  - "Aerial"
  - "Drones"
  - "UAV"
---

# Drone Security Company Raises $20M to Down Drones—Using Drones

![](<https://www.thedrive.com/wp-content/uploads/images-by-url-td/content/2018/03/airspace-nets-hero-01.jpg>)
*\<em\>www.thedrive.com</em>*

We’ve reported on a wide variety of counter-drone measures in the past, from [the seven best anti-drone weapons on the market](<https://www.thedrive.com/drones/11505/the-7-most-significant-anti-drone-weapons>) to [officials contemplating how best to secure correctional facilities](<https://www.thedrive.com/article/12627/alarming-number-of-drones-flew-over-georgia-state-prisons-in-2017>) from unwelcome aerial visitors. But, Airspace Systems, a drone [security company](<https://securitybaron.com/camera-reviews/nest-cam-iq-indoor/>), has just garnered itself $20 million in Series A funding to establish another one. While many anti-drone tech companies rely on jamming rogue unmanned aerial vehicles through radio frequencies or use projectiles to blast them out of the sky, this company is using a more traditional, albeit sophisticated measure, catching the intruding drone with a net.

[According to *Tech Crunch*](<https://beta.techcrunch.com/2018/03/12/airspace-systems-raises-20-million-series-a-to-take-down-dangerous-drones-with-other-drones/>), Airspace Systems is calling its new technologies “kinetic capture,” which are comprised of a system on the ground that identifies any incoming UAVs it deems as threats, deploying its own drones to chase after them, and shooting a tethered net at them to carry them away. In the video below, produced by *Tech Crunch* in 2016, you can see that Airspace Systems had already created the net-launching components of its drones. It has since focused on creating the autonomous drone-identifying technology now firmly a part of this new anti-drone system. Let’s take a look at the humble beginnings first, shall we?

https://youtube.com/embed/HSuQeGz-xv8

[As *Tech Crunch* reports](<https://beta.techcrunch.com/2018/03/12/airspace-systems-raises-20-million-series-a-to-take-down-dangerous-drones-with-other-drones/>), Airspace Systems is a company of 32 employees, with more than two-thirds of them actively working on autonomous drone technologies. “We don’t rely on just one technology anymore, we really include machine vision, onboard radar, lidar - all of these different sensing technologies - to enable us to fly in a variety of environments and do this capture mission,” said Airspace Systems COO Todd Komanetsky. In order to do this, of course, the company needs captital, and it recently acquired $20 million in Series A funding from Singtel Innov8, s28 Capital, Shasta Ventures, Granite Hill Capital Partners, and others. This puts Airspace Systems at a total of $25 million in funding.

“Demand for protecting stadiums, commercial buildings, power plants and, for that matter, any other public venues from potential drone threats is growing rapidly,” [said Singtel Innov8 Managing Director Jeff Karras](<https://beta.techcrunch.com/2018/03/12/airspace-systems-raises-20-million-series-a-to-take-down-dangerous-drones-with-other-drones/>). He’s not wrong, of course, as we’ve seen drones infiltrating airspace above soccer stadiums, correctional facilities, and airports far too often in recent months.

“There are a number of important drone defense technologies flooding the market but there has not been one which integrates all the best capabilities under a single platform until the solutions developed by Airspace,” Karras added. While that may not be entirely true as [companies like DroneShield seem to also be establishing its own all-encompassing anti-drone systems](<https://www.thedrive.com/article/16726/dronesentinel-dronesentry-could-serve-your-anti-drone-needs>), it’s good to see more competition spring up, more investment injected into this field, and innovation continue.

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