ARK Invest is betting on underdog drone delivery company Manna to beat out Alphabet and Zipline

Manna, the Irish drone delivery startup, closed a Series B this month backed by ARK Invest—Cathie Wood’s firm, known for early investments in OpenAI, Tesla, and SpaceX—along with the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund, Schooner Capital, Coca Cola HBC, and Molten Ventures. The capital will be put towards expanding Manna’s U.S. and European operations. Total funding now sits at $110 million. 

Manna, founded in 2018, operates throughout Ireland, as well as Finland and Texas, delivering anything from burritos to biomedical tests. The company has already completed more than 250,000 successful deliveries. It recently announced a new partnership with Uber, and has existing contracts with DoorDash, Deliveroo, and Just Eat. 

The problem Manna hopes to solve isn’t ritzy, but the math and market are.

Road-based delivery in the U.S. costs merchants around $10 per order in driver costs alone. Manna does it for cents in electricity. Its drones fly at around 50 to 60 mph in a straight line, deliver in under three minutes, and turn around in under 60 seconds—eight deliveries per aircraft per hour versus the industry average of 1.2.

Meanwhile, the global rapid delivery economy—same-day and on-demand—is projected to grow 21.3% year-over-year for the next decade, reaching $100 billion by 2034, according to Manna. And the last-mile (from hub to final destination) delivery market was worth an estimated $166.45 billion in 2024 and is projected to reach $311.31 billion by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 9.62 percent.

Manna’s U.S. target is 92 million family homes that gig economy delivery has never served profitably. As Healy notes, there are more than a billion food delivery orders placed annually in the U.S., and not enough drivers to move them without bleeding money. “Drones don’t take jobs away,” Healy added. “You’re giving every small business in the suburbs a better logistics platform than Amazon has.” 

Recent regulatory unlock, according to Healy, is what’s making VCs move now. The FAA has historically required drone operators to keep their aircraft in direct eyesight at all times, making commercial delivery at scale essentially illegal without a one-off waiver for every single flight. In August 2025, the agency proposed Part 108, a new permanent ruleset that would allow drones to fly beyond what operators can see.  The deadline to finalize these rules is mid-2026. 

Manna already has plans for 40 to 50 new U.S. locations in the next 12 months, starting in Texas and Oklahoma.

The competitive field has also thinned to four players: Manna, Google’s Wing (750,000+ deliveries, expanding to 150 Walmart stores this year), Zipline ($600M raise, $7.6B valuation, 2 million deliveries globally, but burning more than $60 per order according to a confidential Q4 2025 memo seen by Fortune), and Amazon Prime Air (~16,000 deliveries). Healy notes Amazon only serves its own parcels, leaving Manna, Zipline, and Wing as the three companies competing for what he calls a $300–$400 billion U.S. opportunity. Manna, however, is the only company in the cohort currently turning a profit on every flight.

In the end, Healy says drone delivery is going to be free. “The only losers here are the people selling cars and e-bikes.”

See you tomorrow,

Lily Mae Lazarus
X: @LilyMaeLazarus
Email: lily.lazarus@fortune.com
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VENTURE CAPITAL

– Patlytics, a New York City-based AI platform designed for the patent process, raised $40 million in Series B funding. SignalFire led the round and was joined by N47, Myriad Venture Partners, Relativity, Alumni Ventures, Antiportfolio Ventures, and BAM Corner Point.

– MOAB, a New York-based operating system for equipment rental and dealership business, raised $16 million in funding across seed and Series A rounds from Elad Gil, Ironspring Ventures, and others.

– Sora Fuel, a Boston, Mass.-based climate technology company, raised $14.6 million in funding. Spero Ventures and Inspired Capital led the round and were joined by Engine Ventures and Wireframe Ventures.

– Livid, a Dover, Del.-based ad-free video hosting platform for creators and small businesses, raised $10 million in funding from Geige Vandentop and Dan Briggs.

– Golden Analytics, a Seattle, Wash.-based AI-powered business intelligence platform, raised $7 million in seed funding from NEA, Madrona, and Breakers.

– Pomo, a San Francisco-based agentic AI-powered marketing platform, raised $4.5 million in seed funding. Kindred Ventures led the round and was joined by Databricks, Seven Stars, SV Angel, 645 Ventures, and angel investors.

– cadootz!, a New York City-based children’s snack brand, raised $3 million in seed funding. Selva Ventures led the round.

– Earlyasset, a Park City, Utah-based developer of financial infrastructure designed to make secondary transactions in venture-backed companies simpler, raised $2 million in pre-seed funding. New Stack Ventures led the round and was joined by Cervin Ventures and others.

PRIVATE EQUITY

– Aero Accessories & Repair, a portfolio company of ATL Partners, acquired New Generation Aerospace, a Medley, Fla.-based airplane parts repair company, and Tri-County Aerospace, a Miami, Fla.-based airplane parts repair company. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– Air Transport Components, backed by AE Industrial Partners, acquired PAS MRO, a Bristow, Okla.-based bearing repair services company. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– Arbiter, a portfolio company of Accel-KKR, acquired Vertical Raise, a Coeur d’Alene, Idaho-based provider of K-12 fundraising solutions. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– Francisco Partners agreed to acquire Blackline Safety Corp., a Calgary, Canada-based safety technology company. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– Harrell-Fish, a portfolio company of New State Capital, acquired Ecofriendly Mechanical, a Bloomington, Ind.-based mechanical solutions company. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– Mission Critical Group, backed by Emerald Lake Capital Management, acquired TxLa Systems, a Huffman, Texas-based electrical switchgear and modular systems. Financial terms were not disclosed.

– MiQ, backed by Bridgepoint Group, agreed to acquire Rocket Lab, a Miami, Fla.-based growth platform for mobile apps. Financial terms were not disclosed.

EXITS

– Steele Solutions, a portfolio company of Revelar Capital, acquired Maysteel Industries, an Allenton, Wisc.-based metal products manufacturer, from Littlejohn Capital. Financial terms were not disclosed.

IPOs

– Arxis, a Bloomfield, Ct.-based designer and manufacturer of electrics and mechanical parts for the aerospace and defense industries, plans to raise up to $1.055 billion in an offering of 37.7 million shares priced between $25 and $28. The company posted $1.6 billion in revenue for the year ended Dec. 31. Arcline Investment Management backs the company.

FUNDS + FUNDS OF FUNDS

– 154 Partners, a New York City-based private equity firm, raised $400 million for its first fund focused on companies in the residential, business, and sports & live event services industries.

PEOPLE

– Gigascale Capital, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based venture capital firm, promoted Evaline Tsai to partner. 

– K8 Capital, a New York City-based private credit and venture capital firm, hired Mark Fiorentino as Managing Partner & Head of Venture. Previously, he was with Bain Capital Ventures.