Ahead of Its 2026 satellite launch, Marble Imaging raises €5.3 million to scale VHR earth observation

Bremen-based Marble Imaging has today announced the closing of its oversubscribed €5.3 million Seed round ahead of their first satellite launch in Q4 2026 – the funding will help scale operations, accelerate product and technological developments for its upcoming satellite constellation.

The round was closed with the help of High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF). In addition, BAB Beteiligungs- und Management-gesellschaft Bremen mbH (BBM), Lightfield Equity, Oslo Venture Company, nwk | nwu Beteiligungsgesellschaften der Sparkasse Bremen, Sentris Capital, Auxxo Female Catalyst Fund and SpaceFounders contributed to the round.

“We’re very happy to welcome a strong European investor consortium that will help drive the growth of our dual-use Earth Observation solutions,” says Robert Hook, CEO of Marble and co-founder. “With this round, we can speed up the enhancement of our capabilities to keep pace with rapidly rising demand.”

European SpaceTech activity in 2025 shows a steady flow of capital into upstream and downstream satellite infrastructure, providing context for Marble Imaging’s Seed round.

In adjacent segments, Spain’s Kreios Space secured €8 million to advance air-breathing propulsion and deploy VLEO satellites, while Belgium’s EDGX raised €2.3 million to commercialise onboard AI compute hardware for satellites. France’s Skynopy obtained €15 million to expand its global ground-station network, and UK-based Spaceflux raised €6.1 million to scale its satellite-tracking and SSA platform.

Together, these deals amount to roughly €31.4 million, indicating that Marble’s raise aligns with broader investor interest across the European satellite ecosystem, spanning propulsion, onboard compute, ground infrastructure and space-situational awareness.

Moreover, a recent EU-Startups commentary on the UK space sector highlights that despite a growing startup scene, the UK’s share of private SpaceTech investment remains modest compared with continental Europe’s – where countries such as France and Germany continue to dominate headline investment in sovereign-capability areas.

In parallel, the launch of the Space TechEU initiative – a €500 million European-wide programme aimed at smoothing the gap between early-stage equity funding and bankable growth capital — coincides with what data show is already a strong year for disclosed private investment in European SpaceTech.

Against this backdrop, Marble’s dedicated focus on very-high-resolution Earth Observation and downstream analytics represents a complementary layer within a sector where European actors are attracting capital across multiple points of the value chain.

“Marble Imaging is addressing a critical European capability gap in the very-high resolution domain and I do not see any other company tackling it faster than Marble does. The need for independent, timely and VHR optical data will only increase in the coming years and I’m happy to support the founders building a European star for a global market,” says Koen Geurts, Senior Investment Manager at HTGF.

Marble Imaging is a big-data EO company founded in 2023 by co-founders Robert Hook, Dr Gopika Suresh, and Alexander Epp, building its constellation of VHR satellites to provide up to hourly EO data and analytics for time critical insights of earth.

The company believes that data and derived EO-based analytics are vital in supporting rapid decision-making with regard to defense, climate security, crises & disaster management, green and sustainable energy transitions, infrastructure and mobility and more.

Marble already offers advanced data analysis services, including object detection for situational intelligence, terrain analytics and trafficability assessment, coastal asset monitoring and land cover classification.

This new funding marks another milestone for the company, following more than €10 million in non-dilutive funding and the signing of Marble’s first anchor contract under European Space Agency’s (ESA) Copernicus Contributing Missions programme valued at €3 million.

That Marble is perfectly aligned with the momentum of the moment is also reflected in the latest outcomes of last week’s ESA Ministerial Council 2025 in Bremen. Member states of the European Space Agency committed to a total budget of €22.1 billion for the next three years – the highest funding level in ESA’s history.

Particularly encouraging for the company is Germany’s decision to increase its contribution to more than €5 billion making it the largest contributor.

The investment will enable Marble to significantly scale its development team and accelerate completion of its intelligence, maritime, and trafficability tools – solutions that already serve early customers and are now being prepared for broad commercial rollout.

It will also support the build-out of Marble’s end-to-end data-processing chain and customer data portal, ensuring a seamless experience for initial users. Additionally, it will allow Marble to expand its operational expertise and establish a dedicated operations center for its planned satellite constellation.

The first Marble satellite, which will deliver very high-resolution multispectral data, is scheduled to be launched in Q4 2026. Marble Imaging plans to gradually expand its own constellation to up to 20 satellites by the end of 2028.

Due to being oversubscribed, not all investors could participate in this round but to accelerate the build-out of the constellation, Marble is preparing for a Series A round in the future.

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