European defence startup Frankenburg Technologies has raised €30 million in Series A funding to expand missile manufacturing capacity across the continent, with the round led by Plural and participation from SmartCap. The company develops low-cost, precision-guided interceptor missiles designed for mass production to address Europe’s growing air-defence bottleneck, where inexpensive aerial threats such as drones can be produced far faster than traditional interceptors. The fresh capital will be used to establish multi-site missile production infrastructure in Europe, including new manufacturing capacity and missile development hubs in the UK and Germany, while securing key components and expanding engineering, safety and export-control teams. Frankenburg aims to produce missiles at scale through modular, containerised manufacturing systems, with planned facilities capable of producing up to 100 missiles per day per site.
Founded in 2024 and headquartered in Tallinn by serial deep-tech entrepreneurs Taavi Madiberk (Chairman) and Marko Virkebau (Board Member), Frankenburg Technologies was created to respond to a structural shift in Europe’s security environment: modern aerial threats can now be produced cheaply and at scale, while missile manufacturing has historically prioritised performance over speed, cost and regeneration.
Taavi Madiberk, Founder and Chairman of Frankenburg Technologies: “For too long, Europe outsourced strength. That must end. I founded Frankenburg because Europe needs a SpaceX-style shift in defence missiles: build fast, move faster, and win on cost and performance. We are sharply focused on counter-drone missiles today, but this is only the first step. Long-term, we are building a global missile leader, delivering lower costs and aiming for higher performance than US or Chinese incumbents across all key missile categories.”
Led by CEO Kusti Salm, former Permanent Secretary of Estonia’s Ministry of Defence, Frankenburg brings together senior defence leaders and missile engineers with experience across leading European and allied missile programmes, including IRIS-T, SPEAR3, Storm Shadow and Brimstone. The company is being built as a new European missile house with sovereign production infrastructure, delivering low-cost, precision-guided systems across air, surface and maritime domains at scale.
Kusti Salm, CEO of Frankenburg Technologies: “Europe’s deterrence problem is not just about budgets, it’s about availability. You cannot deter with systems that are too scarce, too slow to replace, or too expensive to use at scale. Frankenburg was built to restore speed, scale and sustainability to missile defence. This funding allows us to put real industrial capacity behind that mission and build missile systems Europe can actually afford to fire and produce at scale.”
Large-scale aerial threats, from low-cost unmanned systems to more complex cruise-missile-like targets, have become a persistent feature of Europe’s security landscape. While such threats can be produced quickly and in large numbers, interceptors are often expensive, slow to manufacture and available only in limited quantities.
Frankenburg was founded to change this equation. Its missile systems are designed from the outset for affordability, mass manufacturability and integration, enabling armed forces to field interceptors that are an order of magnitude cheaper to use than traditional approaches, while remaining compatible with existing sensors, command-and-control systems and layered air-defence architectures.
In just 13 months, the company has taken its first interceptor, the Mark I short-range air-defence missile, from concept to advanced testing and industrialisation. Mark I was intentionally designed with constrained requirements to enable speed, scale and affordability, and to be produced using Frankenburg’s containerised, modular manufacturing concept, allowing missile production to be localised close to the point of need.
The new funding will be used to build tangible, sovereign missile-manufacturing capacity in Europe, with a clear focus on production, resilience and regeneration.
Sten Tamkivi, Partner at Plural: “In a world where an adversary can deploy tens of thousands of autonomous attack drones, staying safe is not rocket science: defence must be cheap, fast and count in millions of units available. Frankenburg is tackling one of Europe’s most urgent defence challenges by building credible deterrence with missiles, at startup speed. The team combines deep defence expertise with a fundamentally different manufacturing mindset, and we believe this approach can have a lasting impact on Europe’s security and industrial resilience.”
The funding will support the build-out of a distributed missile manufacturing network across Europe. Plans include establishing two EU-based mass-production sites capable of producing around 100 missiles per day each, while securing long-lead components and early production stock to protect supply chains during crises. The company also intends to develop in-house rocket motor and warhead manufacturing capabilities within the EU to gain greater control over critical components.
At the same time, it will expand its missile development hubs in the UK and Germany to support next-generation systems, prototyping and integration across sites, while growing engineering, safety, quality and export-control teams to prepare systems for deployment with European and allied customers. Together, these efforts aim to enable large-scale, multi-site missile production across Europe and strengthen the region’s defence-industrial base.
Frankenburg now operates across eight countries, including Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Germany, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Poland and Ukraine, with teams focused on engineering, industrialisation and a growing network of industrial collaborations across land, air and maritime domains with European and allied partners.
The company’s model is built around manufacturing where systems are used: keeping supply chains short, creating skilled industrial jobs, and ensuring that defence spending strengthens national economies rather than exporting dependence.
By combining modular manufacturing, commercially available components and rapid qualification cycles, Frankenburg aims to give European nations a credible path to sustained air-defence readiness, even under prolonged stress or wartime conditions.
The €30 million Series A brings Frankenburg’s total funding to €40 million and will support the company’s expansion from its first operational systems to a broader, full-spectrum missile portfolio. While Mark I addresses the most immediate air-defence needs, future programmes will expand beyond counter-UAS and short-range air defence into additional air- and surface-launched precision capabilities, built using the same industrialised, scalable manufacturing model.
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Read the orginal article: https://arcticstartup.com/frankenburg-technologies-raises-e30m-series-a/
