Airbility, a South Korean company that makes interceptor aircraft for counter-drone use, said it raised a $4.7 million (KRW 6.5 billion) Series A led by Sazze Partners, according to Pulse 2 on September 5, 2026. Stonebridge Ventures took part as a follow-on investor, Industrial Bank of Korea joined as a new shareholder, and existing investors Samho Green Investment, Mashup Ventures, BASS Ventures and 500 Global also took part. Total funding to date is $7.6 million (KRW 10.5 billion).

The aircraft, as described by Pulse 2

  • AB-U10: a net-gun interceptor flying at roughly 180 km/h, with commercialization planned by the end of 2026.
  • AB-U2: a compact kinetic interceptor, with commercialization planned for the first half of 2027.
  • AB-U4L: a fixed-wing interceptor designed to reach roughly 300 km/h, also planned for the first half of 2027.
  • AB-U60: a mothership for the counter-UAS system, with a launch targeted for 2027.

The report gives no range or endurance figures. Dealroom’s description of the round, seen only as a search-result summary, calls the AB-U2 a direct-strike drone carried on the AB-U60 and the AB-U4L a fixed-wing launcher, which differs from Pulse 2’s description.

What the CEO said in July

The Korea Times reported on July 2, 2026, after an interview with CEO and co-founder Lee Jin-mo, that the AB-U60 has a wingspan of about 3 meters, exceeds 200 km/h after transitioning to fixed-wing flight and can carry up to 10 kg. It is meant to act as a reusable carrier that releases interceptor drones near targets and returns to base, and the company has completed transition flights with three prototypes. Lee said the aircraft gives a “2.5-times speed advantage over typical attack drones.” He cited the war in Ukraine and the recent US-Iran conflict, saying militaries have repeatedly fired interceptor missiles “costing more than 100 times as much” as the drones they target. The performance figures are the company’s.

Customers and plans

  • Pulse 2 names no customers and reports no signed contracts. Airbility says it is in commercial discussions with counterparties in more than nine countries across the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Latin America, with four memoranda of understanding and two joint-venture initiatives in progress.
  • The Korea Times reported that Airbility is exploring partnerships with Thailand’s NT Group and Saudi Arabia’s SANAD Industrial Company, which it did not describe as contracts, and that Lee expects military and government agencies to be the first customers, with demonstration programs run by Korea’s defense procurement agency as the first reference projects.
  • The company says it was founded in November 2023 by a team that includes researchers from Korea’s KT-1, T-50 and KF-21 programs, that about 80% of its 26 employees work in research and development, that it received $2.2 million in research support through Korea’s 2026 Scale-Up TIPS program, and that it targets KRW 50 billion in cumulative revenue by 2028.
  • Lee told the Korea Times that the company develops its own battery packs and flight-control software to reduce reliance on Chinese-made components.

What was said

Kiha Lee, a partner at Sazze Partners, said “Airbility is tackling the cost asymmetry in counter-drone defense.” Jinmo Lee said “This investment gives us the resources to move faster” and that the company will “commercialize our first counter-UAS aircraft this year.”

Where the accounts differ

In July the Korea Times said the Series A was in its final stages and that cumulative funding was expected to reach 10 billion won, about $6.4 million. Pulse 2’s September report gives KRW 10.5 billion, about $7.6 million. Lens did not reconcile the two.

Related: Lens’s overview of drone-interceptor startups.

Sources and notes

Sources: Pulse 2, September 5, 2026; The Korea Times, July 2, 2026. Notes: a search-result summary dates the original release to September 2, 2026; Lens did not read it. Product figures and customer counts are the company’s. Thumbnail photo: “DeltaQuad VTOL surveillance UAV” by Sander Smeets, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons, 2018; cropped and enlarged from a low-resolution original. Illustrative stand-in: it shows another company’s commercial VTOL fixed-wing drone, not an Airbility aircraft.

Image: Sander Smeets (CC BY-SA 4.0), via Wikimedia Commons.