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Quick Facts🗂️
- Company: Lendurai
- Website: https://lendurai.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/lendurai/
- Location: Tallinn, Estonia
- Funding Round: Seed
- Amount Raised: €5.6M
- Lead Investor(s): Expeditions Fund
- Other Investors: Vsquared, HCVC, Lemonade Stand
- All Investors: Expeditions Fund, HCVC, Lemonade Stand, Vsquared
- Total Funding to Date: €5.6M
- Founded: 2024
- Sector: Defense Technology, Autonomous UAV Systems
Company Overview🗞️
Lendurai is an Estonia-based dual-use technology company developing AI-powered autonomous UAV systems capable of operating in GPS- and radio-denied environments.
Its core product is a lightweight, fully onboard autonomy stack that enables drones to execute missions without reliance on GPS, ground stations, or radio links. The system has been validated in real-world operational contexts and is built around modular, compliant hardware suitable for tactical deployment.
Founders: Siim Maivel (CEO), Mark Cowan (CTO) and Sergii Kharagorgiiev (Head of AI Research)
In parallel with product development, Lendurai has formalized a Strategic Affairs function to oversee participation in structured defence R&D programs and public-sector collaboration. The company is actively pursuing non-dilutive funding and partnerships through platforms such as the NATO DIANA Accelerator, European Defence Fund and Horizon Europe. This strategic positioning supports cross-border innovation, aligns with institutional procurement pathways, and reinforces Lendurai’s dual-use mission.
Team Size: 2-10 employees
Funding Round Details💶
On June 5, 2025, Lendurai announced its €5.6M Seed round led by Warsaw-based Expeditions Fund, joined by Germany’s Vsquared and France/U.S.-based HCVC.
According to CEO Siim Maivel, the funds will be used to:
- Scale internal R&D for onboard autonomy, simulators, and flight software
- Expand its engineering team, particularly in ML and embedded systems
- Execute its go-to-market strategy across Europe and NATO-aligned states
- Begin engagement in civil use cases including energy, border control, and emergency response
Market & Differentiation🌐
Lendurai operates within the growing defense-tech and dual-use UAV markets, increasingly focused on solutions for electromagnetic and GPS-contested environments.
Market size: The global military drone market is expected to reach €76B by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 14%. This projected growth reflects the rising demand for resilient, autonomous platforms and underscores the scalability and strategic relevance of Lendurai’s approach.
Demand is surging across both military and civil sectors due to operational challenges in high-intensity conflict zones, like Ukraine, where electronic jamming is causing mission failures with increasing frequency, forcing operators to navigate visually using landmarks when GPS is unavailable.
Lendurai addresses these pain points by offering:
- Full offline autonomy with no external ground control
- Training requirements reduced to less than 48 hours
- Modular, compliant hardware ready for deployment
Despite the dominance of heavyweight defense-tech players such as Helsing (Germany, €1.4B), Quantum Systems (Germany, €380M), and Tekever (Portugal, €100m+), it is notable that younger startups like Lendurai continue to attract strategic attention and institutional capital. What sets Lendurai apart from these scale-ups is its laser focus on tactical-grade autonomy in GPS- and radio-denied environments, designed to operate with minimal infrastructure and under real-world battlefield constraints. Rather than scaling hardware fleets, Lendurai builds a vertically integrated AI stack optimised for agility, cost-efficiency, and modular deployment, qualities often missing from larger dual-use platforms.
It also positioned against two adjacent categories:
- Enterprise dual-use UAV platforms like Auterion (Switzerland, €51M) and Percepto (Israel, $140M), which offer scalable autonomy for commercial or infrastructure-focused missions. While Percepto is more field-deployable and autonomy-integrated, both lack Lendurai’s edge-native tactical flexibility and micro-modular AI stack.
- Tactical defence UAV manufacturers like Primoco UAV SE (Czech Republic, €7M), Delair (France, $43M) and and Threod Systems (Estonia, founding not disclosed) which focus on ISR-certified or loitering-capable platforms, but lack Lendurai’s embedded AI, edge-native autonomy, and micro-tactical software-defined approach.
It is precisely in bridging these divides, between software and platform, between cost and readiness, between R&D and field-grade reliability, that Lendurai carves out its niche.
Investor Insight🎙️
Expeditions Fund team, commented:
“Lendurai solutions deliver advanced autonomous navigation capabilities at a fraction of the cost of traditional systems, offering NATO and allied forces a cost-effective path to GPS-independent operation. This is critical as electronic warfare has become more sophisticated in recent years…”
Why This Matters❗️
The raise comes as NATO and EU defense priorities shift toward greater autonomy, resilience, and low-infrastructure tactical capabilities. As global drone deployment expands, Lendurai is one of the few European-born startups addressing the autonomy challenge from the ground up, no tethers, no towers, no external commands.
Sources🖇️
Sources: https://lendurai.com/, https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/lendurai,https://www.calibredefence.co.uk/lendurai-secures-e5-7-million-seed-funding-to-scale-drones/#:~:text=The%20featured%20image%20shows%20the,Siim%20Maivel%2C%20and%20Sergii%20Kharagorgiiev,https://tech.eu/2025/05/06/tekever-becomes-the-latest-unicorn-in-europes-defencetech-industry/, https://tech.eu/2025/05/06/quantum-systems-raises-eur160-million-for-ai-powered-aerial-intelligence/, https://tech.eu/2025/05/02/tekever-invests-ps400m-in-uk-defence-technology-development/, https://tech.eu/2025/03/10/quantum-systems-acquires-airrobot-to-boost-drone-tech-for-the-bundeswehr-and-european-partners/, https://tech.eu/2024/12/02/poland-takes-a-step-towards-eur100m-defence-fund-a-step-towards-technological-sovereignty/, https://siliconcanals.com/tekever-european-defence-tech-unicorn/?utm_,https://techfundingnews.com/tekever-ai-defence-unicorn-uk-expansion/?utm_,https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/military-drone-market-report, https://defence-industry.eu/lithuania-orders-uavs-from-threod-systems-edge-autonomy-and-deftools/?utm_, https://techfundingnews.com/ai-powered-drone-systems-quantum-systems-160m-funding/?utm_
