WaiV Robotics Raises $7.5M for Autonomous Drone Landings

Jan de Vries · 2026-05-05

A British startup just came out of stealth mode with a solid funding round, and they're tackling one of the trickiest problems in offshore operations: getting drones to land safely on moving ships. WaiV Robotics, based in the UK, has raised $7.5 million in Seed funding to bring their fully automatic landing and takeoff platform to market. The system is built for VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) drones, even when the sea gets rough. "For drones to become a reliable part of offshore operations, the missing piece isn't the aircraft, it's the infrastructure around it," says Johnny Carni, Founder and CEO of WaiV Robotics. ### The Bigger Picture: European Drone Funding WaiV's Seed round is part of a larger trend. A 2026 dataset shows continued investment in European drone, robotics, and autonomy companies. We're talking about everything from maritime ops to drone coordination software and autonomous inspection. The most comparable maritime play is Italy's Mirai Robotics, which raised around $3.9 million for autonomous maritime systems. Meanwhile, UK-based Mutable Tactics, Occam Industries, and Stanhope AI show there's plenty of domestic interest in autonomy software and physical AI. Across all relevant 2026 rounds, about $219 million flowed into the sector. But that number's heavily skewed by Quantum Systems' $163 million financing package. Take that out, and disclosed funding still hits around $55 million. ### Why This Matters: The Offshore Challenge The company says that while drones have gotten really good on land, operating them at sea is a whole different beast. Offshore, the landing surface is constantly moving. Wave patterns shift unpredictably, making a vessel deck way less stable than anything on solid ground. Instead of a drone approaching a fixed landing pad on shore, it has to adapt to a surface that's moving in six degrees of freedom. It might also be salt-covered and slippery on contact. Existing solutions? They've mostly worked only in calm waters or lab conditions, leaving offshore operators hesitant to deploy drones, especially from smaller vessels. ### How WaiV's System Works WaiV's approach centers on the infrastructure needed for reliable UAV operations. Their landing platform is designed to work without human input under tough sea conditions. Here's what the system includes: - **Stabilized landing infrastructure**: AI-controlled software and specialized algorithms drive a gyro-stabilized platform. It effectively "takes over the sticks," guiding the drone via its remote control and removing the need for an expert pilot during landing. - **Impact absorption and secure capture**: The landing pad absorbs impact on contact, and a locking mechanism secures the UAV's skids. The system works with vessels as small as 33 feet and decks of any size. No hardware or software modifications to the UAV are needed. WaiV's patent-pending catch-lock-release landing mechanism, combined with AI-driven predictive algorithms, enables safe and precise drone recovery even while vessels are moving on the open sea. "Our system was designed to remove traditional deployment constraints," adds Johnny. "Without a dependable way to launch and recover at sea, large-scale deployment simply doesn't work. Our goal is to remove that constraint and make drone operations viable from virtually any vessel." Founded in 2023, WaiV Robotics was created to solve a critical challenge for offshore maritime fleets: enabling safe, reliable, and consistent use of UAVs for mission execution while improving operational efficiency.