German autonomous strike drones startup Stark has acquired a Berlin-based company building autonomous navigation software for drones to boost its swarming capabilities.
Two-year-old Pleno creates an AI pilot to turn low-cost quadcopters into autonomous systems that can use vision-based navigation for GNSS-denied environments, as well as neural network-based computer vision for target acquisition. The company says it has secured three pilot projects so far. Stark did not disclose the terms of the deal or the acquisition price.
Stark, also headquartered in Berlin, was set up by fellow German autonomous drones startup Quantum Systems’ cofounder Florian Seibel in 2024. Seibel was approached by the German government to equip Quantum Systems’ surveillance drones with weapons, but was unable owing to some of his investors’ limitations around investing in weapons. Seibel is no longer involved in day to day operations but remains a founding investor.
The startup has been largely secretive and has not officially disclosed funding, but reports say that German-American billionaire Peter Thiel has invested in the startup (Thiel is also an investor in Quantum Systems); other reports say US VC Sequoia Capital has backed Stark.
The acquisition comes as other competitors like AI defence unicorn Helsing are buying up companies. Helsing, which also builds autonomous strike drones, announced last month that it acquired German aircraft manufacturer Grob Aircraft.
Sifted reached out to Stark to confirm the deal size and its investors but did not receive a response by press time.
Read the orginal article: https://sifted.eu/articles/stark-strike-drones-acquisition/
