ST Engineering this week signed up as the final investor in Skyports’ $26.3 million Series B funding round. The aerospace and defense group, which is owned by the Singapore government’s Temasek Holdings, committed to a $3.1 million investment in the vertiport developer and commercial drone operator.
UK-based Skyports has been working with ST Engineering since 2021 on projects including reservoir monitoring and drone inspection services for Singapore’s Public Utilities Board, using ST’s DroNet technology to support beyond-visual-line-of-sight operations. Earlier this year, the partnership was expanded to include Sumitomo Corporation to launch uncrewed aircraft services to deliver parcels to and from ships docked off the coast of the Southeast Asian city state.
Skyports has been active in Singapore at least since September 2019, when it installed a temporary vertiport in Marina Bay for a public flight demonstration of Volocopter’s eVTOL aircraft. In December 2020, the German aircraft developer confirmed plans to launch air taxi service in Singapore.
Earlier this year, Volocopter and Skyports announced its intention to use Singapore’s Seletar Aerospace Park as a hub for advanced air mobility (AAM) services. The plans are backed by the Singapore Economic Development Board.
Other investors in Skyports’ Series B funding round, which the company says was heavily oversubscribed, include Japanese conglomerate Kanematsu, industrial property developer Goodman, Italian airports group 2i Aeroporti, and U.S.-based venture capital company GreenPoint. Skyports has several other AAM partnerships in place across the Asia-Pacific region, including in South Korea, Japan, and Australia.
“Our investment in Skyports stems from our confidence in the future of advanced air mobility and the expertise that Skyports has and continues to grow in building toward that future,” said Soo Soon Teong, ST Engineering’s vice president and head of unmanned air systems. “With even stronger ties now between ST Engineering and Skyports, we will accelerate efforts in marrying out complementary strengths in advanced air mobility and advance the DroNet solution globally.”
