Northwood Space secures $100M Series B and $50M Space Force deal

Space is an area that is becoming more and more populated due to the number of new satellites and the ever-increasing cost of getting into orbit.

These changes have brought attention to the startup Northwood Space, which has spent the last few years creating innovative communication solutions from the ground up. The start upped the ante in two ways this week.

The El Segundo, California-based company announced Tuesday that it has closed a $100 million Series B round of funding, led by Washington DC firm Washington Harbor Partners (which provided $100 million). has been while running about space money) and directed by Andreessen Horowitz.

Northwood also won a $49.8 million contract with the United States Space Force to help upgrade what’s known as the “satellite control network,” which “serves a variety of space missions for our government” including tracking and controlling GPS satellites, founder and CEO Bridgit Mendler said in a press call.

Funding cycle and government cooperation are the main activities of the company, which is only a few years old and only closed its Series A of $30 million less than a year ago.

But being interested in getting money to support space technology, hard tech, and defense tech right now, Mendler said this was an opportunity for his company to grow better and faster.

“Yes, this is happening faster than we thought – you know, two dollars in one year and a lot of money,” he said. But, he added, “that’s what we’ve planned for production.”

Mendler also said the new headquarters will help Northwood keep up with the growing trend, which reflects a “changing environment in the business.”

“We get clients who come to us all the time looking for a solution, they want us to help think through the world’s problems with them, and we don’t want there to be a problem that prevents us from supporting the project,” he said. “So that was brought on purpose at this time to support the missions that are coming our way.”

Part of the attention on Northwood has to do with the fact that what it’s doing — making smaller phased-array antenna systems meant to support or replace older systems that rely on larger dish antennas — remains novel, especially as a vertically-integrated play.

But with the amount of data sent to and from satellites set to continue to grow, it’s an opportunity Mendler wants to press.

“It’s a difficult thing to do. It takes a lot of risk, a lot of money. It takes a lot of different skills to come together, to be able to wrap your head around the whole (station) problem,” Mendler said. “And yes, it’s a big job to do, and our bet is that if we can do that, if we can think about it under one roof, then it will bring a lot of value to the market, and that’s the model to have.”

This has been clear to prospective buyers for some time now. Companies such as SpaceX and Amazon, which have large satellite networks in the works, build and operate their own stations. But the volume is limited to some players who often have to rent space from third-party providers who may not always be available.

Northwood CTO Griffin Wisely expects that the increased volume – which this new investment will help to create – will be of great value to customers who are “growing into large constellations, so they can be like one or two satellites to ten or more.”

Currently, Northwood’s “portal” facility can connect to eight satellites, he said. By the end of 2027, he hopes the next generation of Northwood stations will be able to handle 10 to 12, with the entire industry network capable of connecting to “hundreds” of satellites.

With the Space Force deal, what Northwood is selling has become a good option for the government.

It’s no surprise that the newest branch of the military is starting with the satellite control network (SCN), however. In 2023, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) report noted that the Department of Defense has been aware of the SCN’s potential since 2011.

“Satellite operators who rely on the SCN and who were interviewed by the GAO said this requirement, along with restrictions on system availability, could disrupt their operations in the future,” the report said.