Kelluu Raises €15M To Build Europe’s Persistent Aerial Intelligence Layer And Strengthen NATO’s Surveillance Capabilities

The round was led by the NATO Innovation Fund its first investment in a Finnish company with additional backing from Keen Venture Partners, GungnirCapital, and Tesi. The funding follows Kelluu’s successful completion of two phases of NATO’s DIANA programme.

Kelluu develops and operates autonomous hydrogen powered airships designed for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR). Its unmanned fleet enables continuous monitoring and high resolution data collection across large, remote areas supporting early threat detection and improved operational efficiency.

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The airships are built for quiet, low-emission performance in demanding environments. By combining long endurance with high-precision sensing, Kelluu fills a key gap between satellites and drones.

While satellites provide wide coverage and drones offer detailed imagery, both are limited by endurance, weather conditions and regulations.

Kelluu’s platform supports missions lasting over 12 hours and integrates multiple sensing capabilities to deliver real-time, high-quality imagery. A fleet of five airships can monitor up to 30,000 square kilometres from a single base.

Founded as a dual-use company Kelluu’s technology extends beyond defence to civilian applications such as forestry monitoring, meteorology, smart-city sensing, and critical infrastructure protection.

These capabilities support the creation of high-resolution digital twins while offering cost advantages over traditional manned aviation.

The new funding will help Kelluu further refine its technology, scale operations, and expand deployment of its autonomous airship fleet.

The company is also advancing its long-term vision through Kelluu AI Labs, focused on developing geospatial foundation models for real-world environments, with applications in defence, infrastructure resilience, and environmental monitoring.

Amid rising investment in European defence and increasing demand for persistent aerial intelligence, Kelluu is well positioned to enhance security and resilience across both military and civilian sectors.

We built Kelluu at the edge of Europe, in one of the hardest operating environments outside conflict zones, because we believe that persistent aerial intelligence would become critical infrastructure - not just for defence, but for the resilience of entire countries, said Janne Hietala, CEO of Kelluu.

About Kelluu

Kelluu, founded in 2018 is building a neural digital twin of the environment through a Large Reality Model that combines AI and high-resolution simulation. Its platform enables virtual testing of solutions to global challenges like climate change and urbanization, supported by continuous aerial monitoring for a more sustainable and secure future.