Foundational, a London-based space technology company, has emerged from stealth with £8.2 million in Pre-Seed funding, the largest Pre-Seed round recorded by a European space technology company to date. The company automates and scales Satellite Laser Ranging, commonly known as SLR, the advanced measurement technique used to determine satellite and debris positions with millimeter precision. With this capital, Foundational aims to modernize the aging geodetic infrastructure that underpins safe and efficient operations in orbit.
Addressing Orbital Congestion and Aging Infrastructure
Low Earth Orbit has become increasingly crowded, and operators require precise data on object locations and trajectory changes. The European Space Agency's 2026 Space Environment Report tracked around 45,000 objects at the end of 2025, including an estimated 1.5 million debris pieces between 1 and 10 centimeters. Each fragment is large enough to destroy an operational satellite, while the United Nations has warned that aging geodetic infrastructure for satellite positioning is perilously close to collapse.
A Vertically Integrated Laser Ranging Network
Foundational is rebuilding this infrastructure for the commercial era by integrating the entire SLR system into a single network. This includes retroreflectors mounted on satellites, ground stations that track them, and Origin, the software platform that processes and delivers the resulting data. The approach produces stations that are fully automated and weatherproof, cost around 30 times less than legacy facilities, and are designed to scale as a distributed network rather than as one-off scientific sites.
Millimeter Precision and Early Market Adoption
The network is already operational and tracks objects with millimeter-level precision from distances of up to 2,000 kilometers, day and night, using eye-safe lasers. Foundational compares the capability to spotting from London that a car in Edinburgh has rolled forward by the width of a pencil. Early customers are being onboarded through Origin and its API, and the company already supports missions across commercial constellations, the European Space Agency, UK government bodies, aerospace manufacturers, and research institutes.
Leadership Perspective
Hira Virdee, co-founder and CEO of Foundational, said that automating and scaling Satellite Laser Ranging helps operators identify collision risks, plan safer maneuvers, and make better use of their spacecraft. He added that the opportunity goes beyond tracking satellites, because at scale these measurements can improve models of atmospheric drag, re-entry, and the wider environment around Earth. This would create a new generation of commercial geodetic data products, according to Virdee.
Funding and Founding Team
Foundational was founded in 2025 by Hira Virdee and Dave Gooding, and it builds on laser-ranging technology developed at Lumi Space. The Pre-Seed round was backed by BACKED, Final Frontier, Adjacent, Type One Ventures, and Inflection. This combination of technical expertise and investor support positions the company to expand its automated ground station network across new regions.
Foundational's emergence signals a shift toward commercial, scalable geodetic infrastructure at a time when orbital safety depends on precise, continuous tracking. By combining automated ground stations, satellite retroreflectors, and a software platform, the company addresses both immediate collision avoidance needs and long-term environmental modeling. Its early traction with space agencies, government customers, and commercial operators positions it as a notable player in the next wave of global space situational awareness technology.