British UAS specialist raises £3m to boost development

Unmanned Air System (UAS) specialist Certo Aerospace has raised £3 million in capital to accelerate its flight testing programme of its CAPSTONE Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL) UAS.

The Somerset-based company raised the money through equity placement and will use it to accelerate CAPSTONE development which Certo sees as something that will replace manned helicopters on key missions such as humanitarian assistance, disaster relief and casualty evacuation.

The utiisation of large UAS aircraft will help to the reduce risk to life faced by using manned aircraft on the same missions.

The CAPSTONE UAS is currently the largest UAS flying in the UK today and features a coaxial rotor system which negates the need for a tail rotor by using contra-rotating main rotor blades. Dispensing with the tail rotor also negates the lift energy loss, typically around 20%, meaning all he lift power can be put to the 5 metre long main rotors.

Certo’s Managing Director Justin Tooth commented: “At our pre-deal valuation of £16m, we’re delighted that our original target amount was significantly oversubscribed. This allowed us to expand the raise so that we can now further accelerate the UK flight trials of our 600kg VTOL CAPSTONE UAS and we are delighted to be showcasing two of our flying prototypes at the Future Lab exhibition at Goodwood Festival of Speed.”

Certo’s latest investment comes from existing shareholders and high-net-worth individuals and follows over $5m of inflows from the US Department of Defense in recent years. Certo is actively positioning CAPSTONE UAS for various defence and civil Uncrewed Air System programmes in the UK and USA. 

Certo’s chairman Jonathan Tate added: “This raise was boosted in part by strong industry tailwinds in defence and autonomous technologies, but our impressive flying videos on social media also really helped. Investors swiftly saw that CAPSTONE is more than just another drone; it’s a highly capable, long-range multi-role unmanned helicopter.”