Jeh aerospace nets $ 11 million to scale the supply chain for commercial aircraft in India

The founders of the Indian startup Jeh Aerospace Vishal Sanghavi and Venkatesh Mudragalla had a seat in the front row in the commercial aircraft and its growing growing bottleneck.

The two former leaders of the Tata group spent nearly two decades in different positions in the company and worked on projects that included the participation of global aerospace companies, notably Boeing, Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin.

From now on, armed with $ 11 million in series A financing, the pair works to facilitate the bottlenecks of the global supply chain by expanding the production of metal components for aerodynamic and aerostructure engines, which he then sells to level 1 suppliers based in the United States who work with manufacturers of commercial aircraft such as Iirbus and Boeing.

And they plan to help India become a destination for the manufacture of aerospace components in the process.

“At Tatas, we have released the potential of India for these large OEMs, Boeing, Airbus, Sikorsky and GE (General Electric), but we wanted Jeh Aerospace to unlock India’s potential for major level 1 and level 2 manufacturers in the supply chain,” said Sanghavi, who is also CEO.

Jeh aerospacewhose headquarters are in Atlanta to better access its American customers, has a precision manufacturing installation based on software of 60,000 square feet in the city of Hyderabad, in the south of India. The three -year -old startup has combined precision machines, robotics and IoT devices to reduce lead times of products from the traditional chronology from 15 weeks to 15 days.

The manufacturing approach defined by the Jeh Aerospace software helps to provide predictability and dynamic planning to allow a coherent offer to customers without compromise on quality, said Sanghavi.

And it seems that VC and strategic investors are interested in the height of Jeh Aerospace.

The A series was directed by Elevation Capital, with the participation of General Catalyst. With the infusion of the new capital, Jeh Aerospace raised around $ 15 million in total of institutional venture capital companies. VC Fresh financing occurs less than a month after the startup received an uncompromising strategic investment of Auto Ventures, a venture capital of the Indigo Indigo company.

Ashray Iyengar, director of Elevation Capital, said that the company “has built a truly differentiated approach to aerospace manufacturing”.

Tue strangling aircraft production

Global demand for air traffic increased by 10.4% in annual sliding in 2024, exceeding the 2019 levels of 3.8%, according to data from the International Air Transport released Earlier this year.

The rebound has prompted airlines to extend the fleets, pushing orders even if the industry is struggling with talent and production bottlenecks, like Deloitte notes In a recent report. Level 1 suppliers are faced with prolonged deadlines as Backlog of commercial aircraft reaches a record of nearly 15,700 unitsAccording to McKinsey.

The founders of Jeh Aerospace believe that the use of technology to scale the production of metal components for aerodynamic engines and aerostructures will disconnect this bottleneck. This premise has shaped how Sanghavi, the former chief of the Tata Boeing Aerospace, and Mudragalla, built his workforce for 100 people, his team of advisers and his business model.

Instead of working directly with OEMs like Airbus and Boeing, which makes 30% of commercial aircraft, Jeh Aerospace has deliberately decided to type level 2 and level 2 manufacturers, Sanghavi told Techcrunch, adding that this group is 60% to 70% of planes.

The startup currently has half a dozen paying customers, including GS Precision, based in Vermont and HR Aero, based in Ohio. Sanghavi said that each of these customers is a “high customer and a high customer of the ARR” and that they have the potential to become large accounts in the coming at two years.

“What we believe is that working with less customers, but better customers, not to have a transactional relationship, but a much deeper and significant relationship. So we are also very, very focused on not having too many customers,” he said. “The company does not need too much customers because you can really evolve with few customers very quickly and very quickly.”

The company also brought together an advisory team with deep links with the OEMs of commercial aircraft. The startup has the former president of Boeing India, Pratyush (Prat), Kumar and the former CEO and Managing Director of Airbus India, Dwaraka Srinivasan, among his first advisers and donors.

Jeh Aerospace has achieved notable manufacturing and financial progress in his short life.

Since its seed round of 2.75 million dollars in January of last year, Jeh Aerospace says that it has delivered more than 100,000 components and critical flight tools. The startup has also established a machine capacity of more than 250,000 hours a year.

During the last financial year, the startup reached $ 6 million in annualized recurring income (ARR) and made profitability after taxes. Sanghavi told Techcrunch that he is planning a 3x to 4x increase this year and also has a command book worth 100 million dollars.

The company plans to use the new capital of $ 11 million to evolve its manufacturing and inspection capacities by investing in new generation digital production technologies, Sanghavi said.

The co-founders of Jeh Aerospace see an opportunity to bring more Emergence as a center for iPhone production.

India already plays an increasing role in aerospace manufacturing, with Airbus $ 1.4 billion source The value of the components per year of the country and targeting $ 2 billion by 2030. Boeing, for its part, is Aim for an annual expenditure of $ 1.3 billion and announced his intention to Invest $ 200 million In a new engineering and technology center in Bengaluru in 2023. However, the South Asian nation has not yet reached large -scale success in the manufacture of aerospace components – a gap company like Jeh Aerospace hopes to fill.

Although few Indian startups operate in the manufacture of aerospace components, the sector includes players like JJG Aero, which seems to be a peer for Jeh Aerospace depending on the positioning of the industry. Sanghavi refused to comment specifically JJG and noted that his startup sees his main competition between level 2 suppliers based in the United States.