Ukraine's Buntar Aerospace raises $16M for GPS-denied reconnaissance drones and its AI copilot

Kyiv-based Buntar Aerospace raised $16M in growth equity co-led by Freedom Fund and an unnamed international growth-equity investor, with Gardar, Iron Wolf Capital and Autonomy Capital participating, taking total funding to $30M after an earlier round led by Axon Enterprise. The company builds autonomous reconnaissance drones that operate without GPS and Buntar Copilot, an AI decision-support layer for drone operations; its systems are deployed with front-line units of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The money funds production capacity, product development, hiring and exports into dual-use civilian autonomy. Battlefield-proven autonomy stacks from Ukraine are becoming an investable export category.