Manna, the drone food delivery ‘as-a-service’ company takes flight with additional funding

Manna announces additional funding led by Dynamo Ventures, the world-leading supply chain and logistics-focused fund, bringing the final close of seed round to $5.2M.

Manna is the world’s first aviation-grade B2B drone delivery ‘as-a-service’ company, with plans to roll-out a fully autonomous drone delivery platform beginning early 2020, launching in Europe and the US. The airborne logistics platform ‘in-a-box’ will provide online meal ordering platforms, restaurant chains and dark kitchens with a 3-minute delivery promise to their local communities for a fraction of the cost of road-based deliveries. Manna.Aero uses custom-designed aviation-grade drones built in Europe and the USA.

The Manna drone fleet is operated directly from the restaurant or dark kitchen premises and is accessible via API to food tech providers and online food platforms alike in a channel-agnostic manner; one drone fleet serving all demand to each food provider.

Manna.Aero was founded by serial entrepreneur,  Bobby Healy. Bobby built and sold Eland Technologies to travel industry titan ‘SITA.AERO’ in 2003, he then more recently built CarTrawler – the World’s largest B2B mobility marketplace for the airline industry – now a unicorn status marketplace player that Healy has led through several private equity LBOs and continues to serve on their board.

Commenting on the deal Healy said,  “We are on the cusp of the fifth industrial revolution, powered by drones, and our intention with Manna is to make drone delivery as pervasive as running water. We want to literally transform marketplaces, economies, and communities all over the world in a way that not just reduces our carbon footprint, but saves lives and creates jobs while doing so.”

Adding to Healy’s comments, Jon Bradford who led the investment for Dynamo Ventures said, “It’s hard to find a rockstar team as ambitious and as capable as the Manna team, and in a domain that is as massive as it is difficult. In Bobby and his incredible team, we see a path to capture a real beachhead in this new emerging market that is truly unprecedented and we look forward to helping accelerate their vision in the US in 2020”.