Startup Deep Dive : Astrome Technologies — a decade-old satellite dream finally gets funded

Astrome Technologies has spent a decade chasing a single idea: that broadband could be beamed as cheaply as satellite television once was. For most of that decade, the Bengaluru deep-tech firm could not afford to build the satellites at all — it survived on angel cheques, government grants and a fibre-replacement radio sold to telecom towers and army units. Then, in January 2025, private equity giant Apollo Global Management led a $10 million round (reported as ₹86.35 crore) into a company whose full-year revenue, the year before, had been just ₹8.29 crore.

That gap — a marquee global investor backing a company still earning single-digit crores — is the story of Astrome. It built a wireless backhaul radio called GigaMesh to survive, proved it in villages and army camps, and only now, ten years after founding, is it being funded to attempt the satellite network it originally set out to build.

Quick facts

What they do

Astrome makes wireless hardware that does the job of fibre-optic cable without the digging. Its flagship product, GigaMesh, is a multi-beam E-band (millimetre-wave) radio that telecom operators and system integrators mount on towers to carry 5G-ready backhaul capacity into villages and terrain where laying fibre is slow or uneconomical. The company sells this hardware, and increasingly related services, to telecom operators, government-backed rural connectivity programmes, and defence customers including the Indian Army and Indian Navy, while a newer product line — satellite antennas and payloads — targets the same connectivity problem from orbit rather than from a tower.

The origin

Neha Satak and Prasad H L Bhat met while working on a student satellite programme at the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru. Satak went on to research space systems at Texas A&M University and had already founded an asteroid-deflection venture; Bhat co-founded Streamoid Technologies, an AI-driven fashion-retail startup, before the two reconnected. Their founding conversation, as later recounted to Officechai, turned on a simple analogy: if satellite television could beam a signal cheaply across an entire country from space, why should broadband internet need a cable buried in the ground to reach the same houses? They registered Astrome Technologies on 20 May 2015 in Bengaluru, incubated at IISc, with a founding vision of a low-earth-orbit satellite constellation — later named SpaceNet — that would beam internet directly to rural India the way a DTH dish beams television.

The struggle years

The constellation was the dream; it was also, for a pre-revenue Indian startup, unbuildable. Satellites are capital-intensive and slow to license, so Astrome had to shelve the orbital plan and build something it could actually finance and sell: a ground radio. It took three years of lab work before the company could prove its patented multi-beam millimetre-wave technology actually worked — a milestone the Department of Science and Technology dates to 2018, after which Astrome was granted patents in India and the United States. Through this period the company leaned on the DST-ABI Women Startup Programme and IISc’s backing rather than institutional venture capital, alongside early money from strategic investor Integra Micro Systems.

The thinness of that runway shows up in the filings. As late as the fiscal year ending March 2022, Astrome’s operating revenue was under ₹1 crore, as per Tofler’s record of its MCA filings. A year later, in FY23, revenue had inched up to ₹2.71 crore — but the company lost ₹4.93 crore that same year, a loss nearly twice its revenue, seven-plus years after founding. The September 2021 fundraise of $3.4 million, co-led by Indian Angel Network and Cognizant co-founder Lakshmi Narayanan, was explicitly earmarked for “market expansion to the US” and global operator trials, as per DQIndia — the kind of raise a company makes when it is trying to convert years of unpaid-for lab work into paying customers, not one it makes from a position of comfort.

The turning point

The numbers either side of the turn are stark. In FY23, Astrome earned ₹2.71 crore and lost ₹4.93 crore. By FY24, revenue had roughly tripled to ₹8.29 crore while the loss had narrowed by about 65% to ₹1.73 crore, as per TheKredible’s reading of the company’s filings — the first year the underlying hardware business looked like it might work at scale. That improvement set up the moment that mattered most: on 27 January 2025, Apollo Global Management led a $10 million round (₹86.35 crore) into Astrome, with returning investor IAN Fund participating, as reported by Entrackr and Business Standard. It was Astrome’s first institutional, private-equity-scale cheque in a decade of operating on angel money and grants. Neha Satak framed it as a homecoming rather than a pivot: “This foray into the satcom market represents the timely realisation of the vision with which this company was founded,” she said, as quoted by Inc42 — a decade after the constellation idea had been shelved for want of exactly this kind of capital.

The money behind it

• 2016 onward — angel and institutional seed: Astrome’s first recorded funding round closed on 4 April 2016; early strategic backing came from Integra Micro Systems and angel investors linked to IISc, per Tracxn and Crunchbase records.
• September 2021 — $3.4 million bridge/growth round: co-led by Indian Angel Network (IAN Fund) and Cognizant co-founder Lakshmi Narayanan, with Germany’s Urania Ventures, South Korea’s Impact Collective and India’s ArtPark also participating, raised for US market entry and global operator trials (DQIndia, September 2021).
• January 2025 — $10 million (₹86.35 crore) led by Apollo Global Management: IAN Fund returned as a participating investor; proceeds earmarked for scaling GigaMesh and funding entry into satellite communications (Entrackr and Business Standard, January 2025).
• February 2026 — ₹5 crore government grant: IN-SPACe selected Astrome, alongside Dhruva Space and Azista Industries, for its Satellite Bus as a Service programme, with funds disbursed in milestones (Business Today and Business Standard, February 2026).
• Total raised to date: reported figures diverge — Tracxn puts cumulative funding at $17.6 million across 14 rounds and 89 investors, while Inc42 lists total funding of roughly $13.4 million; a mid-2025 tally cited $15 million across 10 rounds and 86 investors. The company also cites roughly $1.5 million in equity-free grants separately from its equity raises, per Unreasonable Group.
• Valuation: not publicly disclosed by the company or in any source checked for this piece.

How it makes money

Astrome is, first and foremost, a hardware company: it designs and sells radio units, then earns follow-on revenue from deployment and support as operators extend networks tower by tower. Its revenue mix, as best documented, breaks down as follows.

• GigaMesh hardware sales and deployment: multi-beam E-band radios sold to telecom operators and system integrators; the product supports up to 40 links at 2+ Gbps each over roughly 10 km, and Astrome states it can lift a telecom cell site’s backhaul capacity by around four times, per Voice&Data.
• Defence contracts: GigaSat, a flat-panel steerable satellite antenna terminal built for the Indian Navy, was in final testing as of Astrome’s most recent public update; the Indian Army is also a named customer for GigaMesh deployments (Officechai, August 2026).
• Public-sector rural connectivity contracts: a Department of Telecommunications-backed trial used GigaMesh over BharatNet infrastructure to connect 15 villages in Karnataka, with roughly 100 installations targeted by BSNL and Astrome by the end of 2025 (Marico Innovation Foundation, September 2025).
• Overseas licensing and partnership deals: Astrome signed its first overseas telecom-operator deal in Southeast Asia in 2021 (DQIndia), and in February 2023 satellite-chipmaker SatixFy signed an MOU with Astrome to jointly develop a “GigaMesh 2.0” terrestrial backhaul product (BusinessWire, February 2023).
• Milestone-based government grants: the ₹5 crore IN-SPACe satellite-bus grant is paid out against development milestones rather than earned as commercial revenue, alongside continuing DST-linked grant support.
• What people get wrong: Astrome is popularly described as a “satellite internet” company because of its SpaceNet ambitions, but almost all its recorded revenue to date has come from a terrestrial radio product and government/defence contracts — the satellite business is still pre-revenue.

The numbers

Astrome discloses no formal segment margins, but three consecutive years of MCA filings show a company moving from token revenue to a real, if still small, commercial base.

• FY23 to FY24 revenue growth: roughly 3x, from ₹2.71 crore to ₹8.29 crore (TheKredible, reading MCA filings).
• FY23 to FY24 loss reduction: about 65%, from ₹4.93 crore to ₹1.73 crore over the same period.
• FY25 figures: a single database (Inc42) lists FY25 revenue at roughly ₹1.1 crore, sharply down from FY24 and inconsistent with the company’s reported growth trajectory and expansion announcements over the same period; this figure could not be corroborated by a second source and is not carried in this piece’s headline numbers.

Where the money comes from

Astrome was conceived to serve rural, underserved India, and its earliest commercial proof points do sit there — but the customer mix that has actually generated revenue and funding skews toward institutions, not retail rural subscribers.

• Rural telecom/BharatNet channel: 15 villages connected under a DoT-backed BharatNet trial in Karnataka, with an end-2025 target of around 100 installations in partnership with BSNL (Marico Innovation Foundation, September 2025).
• Defence channel: GigaMesh deployed for the Indian Army; GigaSat built specifically for the Indian Navy and in final testing as of August 2026 (Officechai).
• International channel: a Southeast Asian telecom operator became Astrome’s first overseas customer in 2021, alongside selection into Qualcomm and Verizon’s EvoNexus 5G accelerator in San Diego, which the company cites as validation of its technology outside India (DQIndia, September 2021; DST, April 2021).
• Government grant channel: the ₹5 crore IN-SPACe satellite-bus grant (February 2026) and earlier DST-ABI Women Startup Programme support fund research and new-product development rather than being earned commercially.
• The surprise: the company’s most capital-intensive and headline-grabbing segment — satellites — has so far been funded almost entirely by equity investors and government grants rather than by any satellite customer revenue, which does not yet exist; the SpaceNet constellation “remains in early stages with no satellites currently operational,” per Voice&Data.

The risks

• Execution risk on the satellite pivot: Astrome’s newly funded satcom ambitions — a planned constellation of roughly 198 microsatellites under the SpaceNet brand, plus a flat-panel user terminal and V/W-band payload — sit well behind global rivals with satellites already in orbit; as of the most recent reporting checked, none of Astrome’s own satellites are operational (Voice&Data).
• Small revenue base relative to funding and ambition: FY24 revenue of ₹8.29 crore compares with cumulative funding reported at $15 million to $17.6 million (roughly ₹130-170 crore) and a company-stated aspiration of ₹1,500 crore in revenue by FY28 (≈$156 million at $1≈₹96.0), cited by Marico Innovation Foundation — a large gap to close in a few years even allowing for the satcom business layering on top of GigaMesh.
• Dependence on government and defence procurement cycles: a meaningful share of Astrome’s documented traction — the BharatNet trial, Army and Navy deployments, and the IN-SPACe grant, which is explicitly “disbursed in milestones” (Business Today, February 2026) — runs through public-sector budgets and approval timelines rather than open commercial markets, which can slow or stall revenue recognition.
• Crowded, better-funded satcom competition: global operators such as Starlink, Amazon’s Kuiper and Eutelsat OneWeb are already delivering commercial satellite broadband at a scale and capital base far beyond Astrome’s, making the market Astrome is now entering considerably more contested than the terrestrial-backhaul niche it built GigaMesh for.

The takeaway

Astrome’s decade holds a useful lesson for any deep-tech founder sitting on an expensive, unfundable idea: build the version you can afford first. The company did not abandon its satellite ambition in 2015 so much as postpone it, spending years proving a cheaper, sellable radio to defence units and rural telecom programmes while the harder problem waited for capital that could only arrive once the smaller business had a track record. The GigaMesh years were not a detour from the mission; they were the collateral that eventually bought Astrome the right to attempt it. Patience, in a capital-intensive sector, can look indistinguishable from failure for a long time — until the filings turn, and the cheque that was always too big to hope for finally lands.

Frequently asked questions

What does Astrome Technologies make?

Astrome makes GigaMesh, a multi-beam E-band wireless radio that substitutes for fibre-optic backhaul on telecom towers, along with GigaSat, a steerable satellite antenna terminal built for defence use, and it is developing satellite payloads and a small-satellite bus platform under a government-backed programme.

Who founded Astrome and when?

Dr Neha Satak and Dr Prasad H L Bhat founded Astrome Technologies on 20 May 2015 in Bengaluru, after meeting while working on a student satellite programme at the Indian Institute of Science.

How much funding has Astrome raised, and who are its investors?

Reported cumulative funding ranges from about $15 million to $17.6 million depending on the source (Tracxn and Inc42 differ), across investors including Apollo Global Management, Indian Angel Network (IAN Fund), Integra Micro Systems, Lakshmi Narayanan and Urania Ventures; the company’s valuation is not publicly disclosed.

Is Astrome Technologies profitable or listed on a stock exchange?

No. Astrome is an unlisted private company and was still loss-making as of its FY24 filings, though its loss narrowed to ₹1.73 crore that year from ₹4.93 crore in FY23 as revenue grew, as per TheKredible’s reading of MCA filings.

What is Astrome’s satellite venture, SpaceNet, and how far along is it?

SpaceNet is Astrome’s plan for a low-earth-orbit satellite constellation, reportedly of around 198 microsatellites, to beam broadband directly to users; as of the most recent reporting reviewed for this piece, no SpaceNet satellites are yet in orbit, and the company’s near-term satellite work is centred on a government-backed small-satellite bus grant and defence antenna terminals instead.

Sources

Figures are as of September 2026. Currency converted at $1 ≈ ₹96.0 as of 18 September 2026 (Trading Economics).

• Entrackr, “Astrome Technologies raises $10 Mn led by Appollo Fund,” January 2025
• Business Standard, “Astrome Tech raises $10 mn to accelerate wireless connectivity innovation,” January 2025
• Inc42, “Astrome Bags $10 Mn In Funding Led By Apollo Global,” January 2025
• YourStory, “Deeptech startup Astrome secures $10M funding led by Apollo Fund,” January 2025
• MarketScreener India, funding announcement citing Apollo Global Management and Indian Angel Network, January 2025
• DQIndia, “5G DeepTech startup Astrome raises $3.4 mn from IAN Fund and global angel investors,” September 2021
• Department of Science and Technology (Government of India), “A women-led startup develops deep-tech for reliable low-cost internet services to rural areas,” April 2021
• Officechai, “Astrome: The Bengaluru Deeptech Startup Building Cutting-Edge Wireless Solutions,” August 2026
• TheKredible, “Astrome Boosts Revenue by 3x in FY24, Slashes Losses by 65%,” 2025 (reading MCA filings)
• Tofler, Astrome Technologies Private Limited company financial filings, accessed September 2026
• Tracxn, Astrome company and funding/investor profile, accessed September 2026
• Business Today, “IN-SPACe selects Dhruva Space, Astrome, Azista to develop satellite bus platform,” February 2026
• Digital Terminal, “IN-SPACe Awards ₹5 Crore Grants to Three Firms for Small Satellite Bus Development,” February 2026
• Marico Innovation Foundation, “Astrome Technologies: Powering Connectivity Beyond Fibre,” September 2025
• Unreasonable Group, Astrome venture profile, accessed September 2026
• BusinessWire, “SatixFy Signs Deal & Partnership MOU with Astrome to Develop 5G GigaMesh 2.0 Terrestrial Backhauling Product,” February 2023
• CXOToday, “India Mobile Congress recognises industry excellence with IMC 2025 Awards, announces winners of Start Up World Cup India,” October 2025
• Voice&Data, “Astrome: GigaMesh, SpaceNet and a story of Cutting Edge of Connectivity,” accessed September 2026

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