German startup raises €20 million for AI-guided anti-drone lasers
Hanover-based INLEAP Photonics has closed a €20 million seed round to develop laser systems, guided by AI targeting software, designed to neutralise hostile drones around critical infrastructure sites.
INLEAP Photonics, a startup based in Hanover, Germany, has raised a €20 million seed round led by UVC Partners to build laser-based systems for neutralising drones, with AI software handling the targeting and tracking that make the approach viable in real time.
The company is pitching the technology primarily for protecting critical infrastructure — power stations, airports and similar sites — where the growing affordability of consumer and commercial drones has turned what used to be a niche security concern into a much more common one. AI-guided targeting is what separates a modern counter-drone laser from earlier, far clumsier attempts at the same idea: the software has to track a small, fast-moving object accurately enough to guarantee a hit without the manual aiming a human operator would need.
The funding round is one of a wave of recent investments in physical-world AI safety and security applications, a category that has drawn increasing venture interest as drones, autonomous vehicles and robotics move from research projects into everyday commercial use.
