Latvian Aerones has secured $30M in the round backed by Metaplanet and Change Ventures

The Latvian Aerones, which develops robots to provide maintenance services for blades and towers of wind turbines, has raised $30M from Estonian investment funds Metaplanet of Skype’s founder Jaan Tallinn and Change Ventures. Besides, the co-founder of Lithuanian marketplace Vinted and co-founder of Lithuanian venture fund Practica Capital Mantas Mikuckas joined the round.

Lead investors of this round were global growth equity investor Lightrock and European family-run growth equity investor Haniel. Another new investor was a climate-focused fund Blume Equity. Among existing investors were Berlin-based venture capital firm Pace Ventures and Paris VC Future Positive Capital.

Aerones was launched in Latvia in 2015. It has offices in Riga and SanJose. Aerones’s robot performs maintenance services, for example, inspecting, painting, reparation, and cleaning towers and blades of wind turbines. Among its customers are NextEra, GE, Vestas, Enel, and Siemens Gamesa. The company currently operates in North America, Europe, and South America. 

At the end of December, we wrote about $39M received by Aerones. But the names of the investors were not announced. Besides, The company intended to raise $2,5M more in the future. 

Aerones aims to use the new financing to expand its technical and sales functions, increasing the number of on-site robotic crew teams, global scaling, particularly in Africa and Australia and introducing new services to the market.

Metaplanet Holdings is an early-stage investment firm of Skype’s founder Jaan Tallinn. It has 163 companies in its venture investment portfolio.

Change Ventures- is an Estonian seed-stage venture capital fund that backs startups founded by Baltic entrepreneurs. The fund was established by Andris K. Berzins, Rait Ojasaar, and Yrjö Ojasaar in 2016.

Mantas Mikuckas is a co-founder of the Lithuanian marketplace Vinted and co-founder of venture fund Practica Capital which focuses on investments in the Baltic and Baltic-origin ventures in Europe. Established in 2011, Practica Capital has invested in TransferGo, PVcase, Interactio, Eneba, Ovoko, Trafi, CGtrader, and others.