$8.65m boost for Airbound’s autonomous medical deliveries with Narayana Health

Autonomous logistics firm Airbound has raised US$8.65 million in seed funding and announced a pilot partnership with Narayana Health to demonstrate its next-generation drone delivery system for medical logistics.

The funding round was led by Lachy Groom, Co-Founder of Physical Intelligence, with participation from Humba Ventures and existing investor Lightspeed. Senior leaders from Tesla, SpaceX, and Anduril also joined the round, signaling confidence in Airbound’s hardware and autonomy approach. The latest raise brings the company’s total funding to over $10 million.

Airbound’s blended-wing-body (BWB) aircraft features a vertical-lift tail-sitter design, enabling vertical takeoff and landing while maintaining the aerodynamic efficiency of fixed-wing flights. With a payload-to-aircraft mass ratio of 1:1.5, the design avoids the performance penalties common to tiltrotor and quadplane systems. The firm’s proprietary carbon-fiber manufacturing process now allows for daily production of its delivery craft.

“We are grateful to our incoming and current investors for supporting our vision to make the cost of delivery negligible,” said Naman Pushp, Founder and CEO of Airbound. “The healthcare sector represents the perfect testing ground for our technology because it demands both reliability and efficiency.”

The three-month pilot with Narayana Health will see up to 10 daily deliveries of medical tests, blood samples, and critical supplies. Dr Devi Shetty, Founder and Chairman of Narayana Health, said: “Our partnership with Airbound allows us to pilot a promising technology that could significantly improve the speed and reliability of medical deliveries.”

According to Groom, “Airbound’s approach to drone delivery addresses fundamental physics and economics problems that have limited the scalability of existing solutions”.

Airbound plans to use the pilot’s findings to refine its systems ahead of broader logistics expansion in 2026.

Perry Police Department, in the US state of Iowa, has unveiled a new drone for use in locating suspects and missing persons.