Apeiron Labs gets $9.5M to flood the oceans with autonomous underwater robots

Apeiron Labs, founded in 2022 by Ravi Pappu, aims to revolutionize ocean data collection by deploying low-cost autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) that can travel up to 400 meters vertically in the ocean to sample temperature, salinity, and acoustics. Traditional ocean data collection methods rely heavily on satellites that only capture surface information, while subsurface data gathering has been slow, expensive, and limited to costly ship expeditions. Apeiron’s compact AUVs—three feet long, five inches in diameter, and about 20 pounds—can be launched from boats or airplanes and integrate with a cloud-based operating system that predicts their surfacing location and refines ocean models with new data. Recently, Apeiron Labs secured $9.5 million in a Series A funding round led by Dyne Ventures, RA Capital Management Planetary Health, and S2G Investments, with participation from Assembly Ventures, Bay Bridge Ventures, and TFX Capital. The company envisions