SpaceX’s Indian rival EtherealX has achieved a 5x valuation as it prepares for engine tests

Ethereal Exploration Guild, an Indian space technology company known as EtherealX, has risen 5.5-fold to $80.5 million after its latest funding round. The startup is developing a launch vehicle designed to be fully reusable, and is setting up engine ignition tests ahead of the technology’s first test flight, planned for 2027.

The Bengaluru-based company confirms that it has closed an oversubscribed $20.5 million Series A round led by TDK Ventures and BIG Capital, as TechCrunch previously reported. Accel, Prosus, YourNest, BlueHill, Campus Fund and Riceberg Ventures also participated, EtherealX said. This raise comes on the heels of a $5 million seed round in August 2024 that valued the startup at $14.6 million.

As India seeks to mature its space ecosystem beyond small launch pads and component contracts — targeting growth in its space economy to $45 billion from $8 billion over the next decade — EtherealX is among the startups attracting attention.

Satellite operators around the world are looking for more launch capacity and scheduling flexibility in a market as SpaceX’s Falcon 9 sets the standard for pricing and tempo. EtherealX aims to reach this space with its fully reusable vehicle designed to return both the booster and the upper stag. This is an approach that, if proven, could reduce launch costs and increase flight frequency without relying on a local constellation to keep the rockets fully booked.

EtherealX is developing two engines internally: the 80-kN “Pegasus” upper stage engine and the 1.2-MN “Stallion” booster engine, with hot-fire tests targeted for June and July. Thrust, measured in kilonewtons and meganewtons, refers to the amount of lift the engine can generate.

The startup is targeting a November-December 2027 launch period for the technology demonstration vehicle, before commercial missions expected to begin at the end of 2028, co-founder and CEO Manu J. Nair said in an interview.

Rocket engineers also track specific pulse, a widely used indicator of fuel efficiency, which — along with thrust — helps determine how much payload a vehicle can carry for a given amount of propellant.

The Pegasus engine produces 323 seconds of vacuum pulses and uses what the startup describes as a “separate, full-flow cooling cycle.” The engine integrates an additionally manufactured in-house turbo pump. Furthermore, the Stallion booster engine uses a gas regenerative cycle and provides 306 seconds of specific boost at sea level.

Nair told TechCrunch that EtherealX plans to assemble multiple engines per stage for its main medium-lift vehicle, called the Razor Crest Mk-1, with nine Stallion engines on the booster and 15 Pegasus engines on the upper stage.

For comparison, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket essentially reuses the first stage booster while using the upper stage. EtherealX targets deeper reusability by designing its vehicle to recycle both the booster and upper stage.

The EtherealX vehicle is intended to carry up to 24.8 tons in expendable configuration, 22.8 tons partially reusable, and about 8 tons when fully reusable. Nair said the startup is targeting a price of $350 to $2,000 per kilogram over time, depending on the composition and rhythm.

To support development, EtherealX operates a rocket engine testing site in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, known as Base 001, which Nair said is focused on qualifying the upper stage engine. The startup has also acquired a 150-acre manufacturing and testing campus in the proposed space city in Andhra Pradesh which is expected to be operational from mid-2026 for integrated engine and stage testing.

EtherealX has signed launch memorandums of understanding worth a total of about $130 million with customers, including Japan’s SpaceBD and Taiwan’s space agency TASA, as it seeks an early commercial order before its maiden test flight, Nair said.

The latest funding will be used to complete flight qualification of the Stallion booster engine and to conduct cluster launch tests of the Pegasus upper stage engines, Nair said. To support this ramp-up, the startup currently employs 67 people and expects to grow to about 90 people over the next two months as it increases manufacturing capacity and moves to a higher testing cadence ahead of its first test flight.