Satlyt Raises $8M to Run AI Software Across Multiple Satellites
Satlyt’s software has flown on two demo missions, including one that ran Google DeepMind’s Gemma model and cut error-transmission data by more than 60%. The $8M-funded startup’s third mission launches Thursday aboard a SpaceX rocket.
Satlyt, a Sunnyvale, California-based startup, announced in October 2026 that it has raised an $8 million seed round to build software that runs artificial intelligence models on satellites. The round was led by Houston-based Non Sibi Ventures.
The company was co-founded by Rama Afullo, a Kenyan American engineer who previously worked in Google’s cloud computing business and later at SpaceX’s Starlink network in 2024. After pitching the concept of orbital computing at both companies and being turned down, Afullo left SpaceX and launched Satlyt, which also maintains an office in Nairobi.
Unlike SpaceX, Google, or startups such as Starcloud and Cowboy Space Company, Satlyt does not plan to build its own spacecraft. Instead, the company develops software designed to run across many different companies’ satellites. Afullo describes the approach as the “Android” to SpaceX’s “iPhone” — an open, horizontally integrated platform rather than a closed, all-in-one system.
Satlyt’s software has already flown on two demonstration missions. In one, the company deployed Google DeepMind’s Gemma AI model aboard a spacecraft operated by Momentus, reducing the size of a transmission about onboard software errors by more than 60% — savings Afullo says could amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars per satellite annually.
A third mission is launching Thursday on a SpaceX rocket, placing Satlyt’s software aboard a satellite built by Indian startup TakeMe2Space. Customers on the mission include NASA, space surveillance startup Stellerian, and TakeMe2Space itself. The launch coincides with the debut of Google’s space data center prototype, Project Suncatcher.
Next year, Satlyt plans to attempt linking two separate satellites into a shared computing system, a step toward offering a full orbital cloud computing service to spacecraft operators. Non Sibi partner Kent Lucas noted that the business does not depend on large-scale space data centers to succeed: “It can just be driven by the number of satellites going up.” Afullo’s target is to have Satlyt’s software running on 20% of satellites by the end of the decade.