The robotics company Icarus, co-founded by Jamie Palmer and Ethan Barajas, has successfully raised $6.1 million in a seed funding round. The funding, backed by Soma Capital, Xtal, Nebular, and Massive Tech Ventures, will support the development of a versatile robotic workforce for space. Headquartered in New York, Icarus is creating intelligent robots capable of interacting with their environment to perform routine space tasks, from spacecraft operations to large-scale orbital construction like satellite maintenance.
The initial robots are human-operated, but the company aims to develop autonomous machines using embodied AI, which learns from real-world interactions and human demonstrations. Jamie Palmer, the company’s CTO, emphasized the need for advanced robotics in space, highlighting the outdated control methods currently in use. With the space industry poised for growth, the limited number of active astronauts and the reliance on inflexible robotic systems pose significant challenges.
CEO Ethan Barajas pointed out the inefficiency of employing highly skilled astronauts for basic tasks, advocating for robots to handle repetitive work, allowing astronauts to focus on human-exclusive discoveries. Icarus has already developed several prototypes and established partnerships with NASA and leading commercial space station developers. Soma Capital’s managing partner, Aneel Ranadive, expressed enthusiasm for supporting Icarus as they address critical bottlenecks in the space economy, positioning the company to capture significant value as space manufacturing expands.
