Polish space company KP Labs has raised EUR 4.42M from Momentum Capital Partners to scale AI data processing that happens in orbit rather than on the ground.
The bottleneck it addresses is bandwidth. Satellites now generate more data than operators can transmit back to Earth, and the economics of downlinking everything are getting worse as constellations thicken and orbital space becomes a defence priority.
KP Labs builds specialised processing units, firmware and AI algorithms that analyse data onboard, selecting what matters and sending only that down. The result is faster, cheaper delivery of useful information.
Customers include space agencies and satellite manufacturers. The company works with the European Space Agency and NASA, as well as Airbus Defence and Space, OHB Hellas and Thales Alenia Space. Its own satellite, Intuition-1, operated from 2023 to 2026 collecting Earth observation data on soil conditions, vegetation and pollution, and its algorithms have run aboard the International Space Station, where Polish astronaut Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski tested lunar mapping code.
Chief executive Michal Zachara says the company has spent years building capability proven in actual missions rather than simulations.
KP Labs is also involved in CAMILA, a Polish national space mission, giving it a domestic anchor as European governments push to keep space capability onshore.