SYOS Aerospace, the uncrewed vehicle manufacturer with R&D and production facilities in Fareham, has secured its first round of institutional investment as it looks to expand manufacturing capacity and meet rising demand from allied customers.
The round was led by Outset Ventures and anchored by NZVC, with participation from Altered Capital and a number of undisclosed strategic funds. It took the form of a convertible note, and the terms have not been made public. Outset Ventures Managing Partner Angus Blair joins the SYOS board as part of the deal.
The raise marks a shift for the company, which until now has funded five years of growth entirely through customer contracts. Among those is a £30m agreement signed with the UK Ministry of Defence in 2025.
From Mount Maunganui to NATO
SYOS was founded in 2021 in Mount Maunganui, New Zealand, and won its first contracts in 2023 through competitive MoD tenders. It is now jointly headquartered in the UK and New Zealand, employs almost 200 people, and operates across NATO and the Indo-Pacific. The company also maintains an operational and support presence in Ukraine.
In February 2026 it secured a sovereign defence contract with the New Zealand Defence Force to supply a suite of uncrewed vehicles for experimentation, alongside services and training. Canada is also listed among its customer nations.
One autonomy layer across four domains
The company builds uncrewed vehicles for air, land, sea and underwater use, all running on its proprietary AAIMS (Autonomy and Augmented Intelligence Mission System) software. Customers can buy a single platform or a mixed fleet, with AAIMS providing a common autonomy layer so vehicles from different domains can operate together.
SYOS says it has proven serial production lines across multiple product types and has delivered more than 150 uncrewed surface vehicles (USVs) to allied nations, making it one of the world’s largest USV manufacturers. Its systems have been used operationally in Ukraine, where front-line feedback has driven rapid spiral development.
SYOS CEO and founder Sam Vye
The company’s design approach keeps platforms deliberately lean, concentrating investment in autonomy and sensing to drive down cost per capability.
Recent milestones include the SA200 uncrewed heavy-lift helicopter completing fully autonomous mission trials in March 2026, including take-off and landing from a moving platform. The aircraft is now ready for serial production. In May, SYOS launched the SU10 uncrewed underwater vehicle, which is being paired with its USV range.
What the investors say
Founder and CEO Sam Vye said the company had spent recent years showing that a startup could compete with some of the largest defence and technology firms in the world.
“Through first-class engineering and operational delivery, we’ve built a global team, delivered systems into service, and earned the trust of customers across allied nations,” he said. “This capital will accelerate our next phase of growth: to expand our global footprint, invest further in our already very strong R&D capacity, and increase production capacity to meet growing customer demand.”
NZVC General Partner Mark Pavlyukovskyy pointed to the company’s delivery speed and self-funded model. “Its uncrewed systems ship in months, at volume, financed by customer contracts alone,” he said, adding that NZVC would support SYOS as it scales production in the UK and New Zealand and help open doors in the US defence and technology sectors.
Blair described building a defence manufacturer on limited capital and customer revenue as “rare”, noting that SYOS is already delivering fieldable capability across NATO and the Indo-Pacific.
SYOS SA1
Why it matters
The round gives a UK-based uncrewed systems producer with a track record of MoD delivery additional headroom to increase output from Fareham, at a time when demand for affordable, rapidly produced autonomous platforms continues to grow across allied forces. The involvement of NZVC also signals an intent to push into the US market.
