Reliable Robotics Tops $1 Billion After $115 Million Raise for Cargo Autopilot
Reliable Robotics has secured $115 million in new financing, lifting its valuation above $1 billion. The Mountain View, California-based company closed the raise as an extension to its Series D round, or added funding to a prior late-stage round. TechCrunch
The $115 million splits between $90 million in equity, or selling shares, led by Nimble Partners, and $25 million in debt, or borrowed money, from Silicon Valley Bank. With the addition, the Series D now totals $275 million and total capital raised to date reaches $380 million. Other participants include Gideon Strategic Partners, RockCreek, Geek Ventures, Gold Hill Capital and Sparkwave Capital.
The company was co-founded by CEO Robert Rose and CTO Juerg Frefel. Rose is a former director of flight software at SpaceX who also worked at Tesla and Google. Frefel is a SpaceX veteran who spent nearly a decade there as an engineer.
Its plan is incremental automation, adding automation step by step instead of removing the pilot at once. The first product, described as continuous autopilot engagement, handles engine startup, taxiing, takeoff and landing with the pilot remaining in the aircraft. Rose expects certification, or formal approval from aviation regulators, for that system in 18 to 24 months.
A second certification would move the pilot out of the cockpit to a ground-control station. That step is at least three years away. The order keeps a certificated pilot in the loop for the near-term system while the company builds flight history and operational data for remotely supervised operations.
Reliable Robotics also built its own solid-state collision-avoidance radar, meaning a radar with no moving parts. Rose expects that sensor to be certified by the end of 2027. Building the radar in-house gives the company control over the sensing equipment its autopilot uses to keep distance from other aircraft, including in instrument conditions, or cloudy weather when pilots fly by instruments, and in airspace with non-cooperative traffic, or aircraft that are not broadcasting their position.
To operate and learn, the company runs its own carrier. Reliable Airlines is based in Albuquerque and uses six Cessna Caravans to fly cargo six days a week.
As of April 2026, the company had raised $300 million in total funding and was pursuing use of its automated technology by air cargo companies including FedEx Corp. Bloomberg The company had also announced $160 million in new investment and a plan to begin autonomous cargo operations in 2026. Reliable Robotics Those figures now sit inside the updated $380 million total reported with the October extension.
The broader context here is that certification strategy is acting as product strategy. Starting with a pilot on board lowers the initial approval hurdle compared with uncrewed flight. It allows operation under current rules, crew workload reduction, and data collection before regulators are asked to approve cargo legs with an empty cockpit.
In my view, the pieces point to a patient path to cargo autonomy. If the 18 to 24 month certification holds and the radar clears by the end of 2027, the company would enter the remote-pilot phase with its own sensor, its own airline experience, and debt alongside equity to cover hardware and fleet costs and fund that kind of operation at scale.
