Letara, a Sapporo-based startup building hybrid propulsion systems for spacecraft, has collected ¥2.6 billion, about $16M, to push beyond satellite thrusters into larger rocket systems for space, defense and security markets.
Three firms co-led the round: Headline Asia, JIC Venture Growth Investment and Incubate Fund. On the strategic side came NES Corporation, an energy player; Toyoda Gosei, a Toyota Group parts supplier; and Frontier Innovations, a fund backed by Japan’s space agency JAXA.
Co-CEO Shota Hirai said the company now plans to explore a much wider set of use cases and develop hybrid rocket systems tailored to each market. The startup spun out of Hokkaido University in 2020, founded by Hirai and fellow co-CEO Landon Thomas Kamps, who met while researching rocket propulsion there.
The core design keeps solid fuel apart from the liquid oxidizer that combustion requires. Plastic and rubber, cheap and easy to source, do the fueling; a proprietary process shapes and compresses them so they burn reliably, and the company claims more thrust with less waste than paraffin-based rivals.
Letara says it has already won orders from rocket and satellite companies as well as the Japanese government, without disclosing their value. Its next milestone is an in-orbit firing test with an overseas partner, a key step toward commercialization.
The move comes as Japan pours billions into its space industry and eases defense export restrictions. The global hybrid rocket propulsion market is projected to grow to $2.6B by 2032, up from $848M in 2024.
