PrecisionHawk Raises $18 Million in Series C Funding

PrecisionHawk the North Carolina based developer and manufacturer of UAV systems, has announced it received a serious chuck of change in a Series C round of funding. Participating in the $18 million dollar round are: Verizon Ventures, USAA, Intel Capital, Yamaha Motor, NTT Docomo Ventures with full participation from existing investors: Intel Capital, Millennium Technology Value Partners and Indiana University’s Innovate Indiana Fund.

To date PrecisionHawk has received more than $30 million to put to use as it continues to build out its UAV technology and expand globally.

PrecisionHawk got its start in the agriculture market but has recently been focusing a good deal of time and energy in developing a low-altitude safety infrastructure and terrestrial data services.

They intend to apply the new funding to accelerate the development of that terestial data analysis he new equity funding will further accelerate the expansion of PrecisionHawk’s terrestrial data analysis platform, DataMapper. Datamapper can ingest data from all drone systems but, in the future, will combine aerial data from satellites and manned aviation so users can manage, analyze and compare all incoming data sources on a single platform.

“At USAA, we’re constantly seeking ways to better serve our members, so we’re always on the lookout for innovative companies and emerging technologies,” said Nathan McKinley, head of USAA Corporate Development. “We’re excited to invest in PrecisionHawk because they lead the industry in developing unmanned aerial systems — a technology we feel can help rebuilding following catastrophes.”

“Adoption of UAV technology among major industries is growing at an incredible rate,” said Dave Famolari, director of Verizon Ventures. “I believe that PrecisionHawk’s high resolution aerial data capture, analysis and storage platform can deliver unique insights and actionable data that can improve critical decision making across several industries.”

The company also intends to apply resources to the development and commercialization of their Low-Altitude Traffic and Airspace Safety platform, LATAS, to allow safe and rapid integration of drones into national airspaces. To date, LATAS has won contracts with both state and international governments and has been successfully demonstrated over Verizon’s LTE network under the FAA Pathfinder and NASA UTM programs.

“The company’s LATAS initiative promises to be a key component to safely integrate drones into our national airspace and expand the potential applications for drone technology. We look forward to building our relationship with PrecisionHawk as it continues to innovate and expand into new industries and geographies,” Famolari said.

“Individuals and organizations across the world need better and more accurate data to manage the resources of our planet, and we are delighted to receive such a strong level of support and confidence from this group of investors to help us build out a platform for the industry,” said PrecisionHawk CEO Bob Young. “This team of partners and investors is collaborating to better serve the need for managing terrestrial change data. Providing a safe and reliable platform for managing aerial data is both an exciting and important project for our engineers and our partners.”