U.S. tech VCs are backing a new play to rebuild the drone stack from the silicon up.
Hyfix Spatial Intelligence just raised a $15 million seed round to create an American-made “brain” for drones and robots, Fortune learned exclusively. The Santa Clara, Calif.-based startup is developing a single autonomous-systems chip that folds flight control, high-precision positioning, secure communications, and onboard compute into one U.S.-manufactured system-on-a-chip. This replaces the mix-and-match electronics that power most drones today.
Craft Ventures led the round, joined by Catapult Ventures, Multicoin Capital, Finality Capital, and hard-tech investor Sky Dayton. (Craft, notably, was cofounded by David Sacks, who until recently was President Trump’s crypto and AI czar.)
“There is currently no end-to-end American supply chain for drones,” Jeff Fluhr, partner at Craft Ventures, told Fortune. “Hyfix is tackling one of the most critical pieces, custom silicon, so U.S. companies can build world-class autonomous systems without depending on foreign technology stacks.”
That gap is colliding with policy. The FCC’s late-2025 move to block approvals and imports of certain Chinese-made drones and radio frequency gear has effectively accelerated demand for domestic alternatives, even as DJI contests the restrictions in court. For startups like Hyfix, the regulatory tailwind is vital.
The market opportunity is large—and still heavily tilted overseas. Global drone revenues are expected to climb into the tens of billions by decade’s end, with commercial applications alone projected to grow from roughly $30 billion in 2024 to about $55 billion by 2030. And, global drone production, Craft Ventures estimates, has already reached the low tens of millions of units annually. Yet DJI continues to dominate, controlling roughly 80% of the global civilian drone market and an even larger share in the U.S.
Hyfix is pitching itself as one of the domestic alternatives those policies are meant to create. The chip is designed to keep working when GPS is jammed or spoofed, a growing concern in both defense and commercial settings. It taps into CEO Mike Horton’s other project, Geodnet—a decentralized network of roughly 21,000 ground reference stations—as well as newer low Earth orbit satellites to get more accurate, harder-to-fool positioning.
“Geodnet is a high-precision geospatial network,” Horton told Fortune. “It uses reference stations that are put up to allow for more resilient and more accurate positioning than GPS alone, which is easily jammed and spoofed and doesn’t work very well for things like robotics.”
Horton and his cofounder, Udan Ercan’s, backgrounds feed directly into that pitch. His career in autonomous systems ranges from early self-driving tractors to drones, while Ercan is a global navigation satellite system expert who built high-precision positioning systems at Topcon and globally. Geodnet’s infrastructure, Horton says, will integrate with Hyfix’s chip so drones can “provide both a trusted position and a more accurate position” even when signals are being manipulated.
The new capital will go toward finishing the chip design and tape-out. Hyfix plans to start shipping production-ready chips to select partners this year and is also building a sub-250-gram reference drone to demonstrate the platform.
Fluhr’s bet extends beyond drones. Within two years, he expects Hyfix to be supplying chips across multiple drone categories. Longer term, he sees the same architecture powering a broader wave of autonomous machines—from industrial systems to humanoid robots.
See you tomorrow,
Lily Mae Lazarus
X: @LilyMaeLazarus
Email: lily.lazarus@fortune.com
Submit a deal for the Term Sheet newsletter here.
Joey Abrams curated the deals section of today’s newsletter. Subscribe here.
VENTURE CAPITAL
– nEye, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based developer of integrated Optical Circuit Switches designed to accelerate AI data center connectivity, raised $80 million in Series C funding. Sutter Hill Ventures led the round and was joined by CapitalG, M12, Socratic Partners, and others.
– Adcendo, a Copenhagen, Denmark-based developer of drugs designed to treat cancers with unmet medical needs, raised $75 million in Series C funding. Jeito Capital led the round and was joined by Vida Ventures, BPI France, EIFO, and existing investors.
– Lightcast, a Cambridge, U.K.-based single-cell analysis company, raised $27 million in funding. ARCH Venture Partners led the round and was joined by M Ventures, Illumina Ventures, +ND Capital, Longwall Ventures, and OMX Ventures.
– Auctor, a New York City-based agentic operating system for professional services and system integrators, raised $20 million in Series A funding. Sequoia Capital led the round and was joined by M12, HubSpot Ventures, Workday Ventures, OneStream, Y Combinator, and Tercera.
– Nava, a New York City-based platform designed to guardrail AI financial agents, raised $8.3 million in seed funding. Polychain and Archetype led the round and were joined by FalconX, Hack VC, Seed Club Ventures, and others.
– Osteoboost Health, a San Francisco-based medical equipment manufacturing company, raised $8 million in funding. Ambit Health Ventures led the round and was joined by Emmeline Ventures, Disrupt Health Impact Fund, and existing investors.
– TraqCheck, a London, U.K.-based AI-powered employee background checking and talent sourcing human operating system, raised $8 million in Series A funding. IvyCap Ventures led the round and was joined by IIFL.
– Pumpcade, a New York City-based prediction markets platform, raised $5 million in seed funding. Foundation Capital and Jump Crypto led the round.
– Peak Quantum, a Munich, Germany-based quantum computing startup, raised €2.2 million ($2.6 million) in funding. Cloudberry Ventures led the round and was joined by United Founders, QAI Ventures, Golden Egg Check, and angel investors.
– Sapient Perception, a Copenhagen, Denmark-based developer of a physical AI sensor system for unmanned aerial vehicles, raised €2 million ($3.3 million) in pre-seed funding. Balnord and FORWARD.one led the round.
PRIVATE EQUITY
– Fortreum, backed by Gryphon Investors, acquired Kovr.ai, a Reston, Va.-based compliance platform designed for companies in highly-regulated industries. Financial terms were not disclosed.
– Horsburgh & Scott, a portfolio company of GenNx360 Capital Partners, acquired Franklin Machine & Gear, a Humble, Texas-based machining and gearing manufacturing facility. Financial terms were not disclosed.
– TPG agreed to acquire Learfield, a Dallas, Texas-based college sports media sales and technology provider. Financial terms were not disclosed.
IPOs
– The Elmet Group, a Portland, Maine-based manufacturer of critical materials and engineered microwave products, plans to raise up to $107.8 million in an offering of 7.7 million shares priced between $12 and $14. The company posted $202 million in sales for the year ended Dec. 31. Anania & Associates Investment Company, George Schott, and Marc Lamare back the company.
PEOPLE
– Advance Venture Partners, a San Francisco-based venture capital firm, promoted Ameen Dalli to Vice President.
