Involve, the leading Italian company for stratospheric ballon technology closed a EUR 2.5M seed round with lead investor Earlybirdand welcomes renowned astronaut Paolo Nespoli to its Advisory Board.

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Involve, the leading Italian company for stratospheric balloon technology applicable to real time Earth monitoring, telecommunications and infrastructure, closed a EUR 2.5M seed round after 30 successful commercial launches and extensive testing. With the closing of this round, Involve is welcoming Alastair Westgarth, former CEO of Google’s Project Loon, to its executive Board of Directors, and renowned astronaut Paolo Nespoli to its Advisory Board.

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With the closing of this round, Involve also announces the formation of its new board of directors. Founder Jonathan Polotto will continue to serve as CEO and Chairman. He will be joined by Alastair Westgarth, former CEO of the pioneering Google Loon ballooning project, known for his innovative contributions to global connectivity and aerospace. Claudio Piazzai, partner and Chief Operating Officer, will remain instrumental in supporting the growth of the company, especially abroad. The astronaut Paolo Nespoli, who brings along extensive space experience, will join the Advisory Board.

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The Investment

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The investment is led by Earlybird Venture Capital, one of Europe's leading VCs (EUR 2.5B AUM), supported by Takeoff, the accelerator dedicated to aerospace and advanced of the CDP Venture Capital National Network (the largest Italian VC with 3.8 billion euros AUM), co-invested by Unicredit, Fondazione CRT and Plug and Play which manages it also operations.Also participating in the round is TLI Space, a structure specialized in venture capital investments in the space and technology sector, promoted by Cenciarini & Co, a holding company for early-stage ventures.

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The round is supplemented by EUR 500K in convertible loans. This round represents a major milestone for Involve, which also becomes the first Italian startup chosen by Earlybird-X.

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Earlybird-X partner Dr. Philipp Semmer says: "We are excited to partner with Jonathan, Claudio and the entire Involve Team in building the next generation of high-altitude balloon platforms. The team convinced us with their execution capabilities of gathering substantial initial traction with very little capital. Additionally, they were able to attract some of the leading heads inthe space such as Alastair Westgarth. Involve will define a new category of earth observation technology, and we are happy to be part of the journey, alongside CDP and TLI Space."

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Involve will use the funds to accelerate the development of its stratospheric balloon technology for achieving several technical milestones. These include enhancing flight duration, optimizing control systems through artificial intelligence, and expanding payload capacity. The company also plans to grow its team with new hires in key areas such as aerospace engineering, software development, and data management teams. Additionally, Involve will continue to expand its international presence by strengthening existing partnerships and developing new ones, particularly in the surveillance, environmental monitoring, and telecommunications sectors.

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“Our next step should be somewhere near Houston, USA” Polotto says, "Here, for more than a month, I had the opportunity to develop contacts and do quite a bit of networking. This will be, verysoon, our next step, thanks to our board member Alastair Westgarth and business developer Courtney Stadd, former Deputy Associate Administrator at NASA and ex Director of Commercial Space at The White House”.

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The Company was assisted by Studio Del Prato with Giulio Andreotti, Director of Legal Affair of Involve Space, Earlybird was assisted for the transaction, the legal due diligence and the golden power aspects by RPLT RP legalitax, with Stefano Chiarva and Marco Gardino, TLI by Alpeggiani Avvocati Associati with Francesco Torelli. The tax and financial due diligence was supported by Spada Partners. The notarial aspects were carried out by Busani & Partners, with the notary Giacomo Ridella.

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Press Office contacts:

Matilda Galluzzo, Head of Communication

matilda.g@involvespace.eu, +39 333 121 0356

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