Investment: “Stoke Space raises $1 billion”
Stoke Space, a company developing fully reusable rockets that aim to return both the booster and the payload-carrying second stage, has completed the initial closing of a $1 billion Series E round led by Point72 Ventures and Spark Capital.
The round included investments from General Innovation, Glade Brook Capital, US Innovation Technology, Washington Harbour Partners, Woven Capital and Y Combinator, among others.
CEO Andy Lapsa said the company is pursuing an approach that actively cools the vehicle’s thermal shielding by flowing super-cooled liquid hydrogen through it — a solution Stoke has tested extensively on the ground and plans to deploy on its first flight. Stoke’s first vehicle, the Nova Pathfinder, is intended to carry three metric tons to low-Earth orbit and has multiple Pathfinder vehicles in production; the company has already sold launch contracts on the vehicle. Ground structural and operational tests have been performed at Stoke’s Moses Lake facility, and the firm is preparing to test-fire each stage on the ground before combined operations.
Stoke is also developing a larger follow-on vehicle, the Nova Block 2, built on the same engines and novel heat-shield technology; Block 2 is designed to deliver 15 metric tons to low-Earth orbit with a target deployment in 2029. With this latest close, Stoke has now raised $2.3 billion in total.
The company says the Series E is intended to scale production and flight frequency, lay the necessary infrastructure, prepare the larger vehicle for operations and fund development of the second-generation vehicle as Stoke works to reach orbit.
“This round is really to scale,” CEO Andy Lapsa said. “To lay the infrastructure, to scale in production and flight frequency, and importantly to fund the development of the second generation vehicle.”
