The forestry industry has been cutting trees the same way for decades. AirForestry wants to do it from the sky. The Swedish climate tech startup has secured SEK 28 million (approximately EUR 2.6 million) in pre-Series A convertible financing from existing investors to accelerate the development of the world's first aerial tree harvesting technology. The round is a pre-commit to the upcoming Series A and was led by Northzone, whose Partner Par-Jorgen Parson now serves as Chairman of the Board.

The funding arrives as AirForestry transitions from proven concept to advanced field validation, a critical milestone for any hardware startup and an especially demanding one when your machine needs to operate autonomously in dense forest canopy. Founder and CEO Caroline Walerud says the capital will fund 12 new engineering hires and a push into real-world testing at scale.

If the technology works as designed, it could rewrite the economics and environmental footprint of commercial forestry across Europe and beyond. That is a big if. But the investor conviction behind it is real, and the problem it addresses is enormous.

Traditional forestry relies on heavy ground-based machines, harvesters and forwarders that weigh upward of 20 tonnes, to fell, process, and extract timber. These machines require access roads, cause significant soil compaction, damage root systems of remaining trees, and leave ruts that alter water drainage patterns for years. In sensitive ecosystems, the collateral damage can undermine the very forest regeneration that sustainable forestry is supposed to support.

AirForestry's approach eliminates ground contact entirely. The company is building an electric, automated aerial system designed for precision thinning, selectively removing individual trees from above without heavy ground infrastructure. The system architecture is engineered for automation, repeatability, and scalability, introducing a new machine category into an industry where core equipment design has remained largely unchanged for decades.

Thinning is the practice of removing selected trees to give the remaining ones more space, light, and nutrients to grow. It is a routine silvicultural operation performed multiple times during a forest's rotation cycle, and it represents a massive addressable market. In the European Union alone, roundwood removals exceeded 500 million cubic meters in 2022, according to Eurostat.

The convertible financing follows AirForestry's EUR 10.3 million seed round led by Northzone in 2024. Par-Jorgen Parson, the Northzone Partner who led both the seed and convertible rounds, is one of the Nordic region's most experienced deep tech investors, with a portfolio that includes Spotify, iZettle, and Trustly. His decision to double down, and take the chairman role, signals that AirForestry has hit its technical milestones.

CEO Caroline Walerud, who assumed the role in late 2025, brings operational intensity to a company that now needs to bridge the gap between prototype and product. "We are moving from a proven concept to advanced field validation," Walerud said. "This pre-commit to the Series A from our existing investors validates both the technology and the market opportunity."

The European Union's forestry sector is caught between competing demands. The EU Forest Strategy for 2030 calls for planting three billion additional trees while simultaneously increasing timber harvest to replace carbon-intensive materials like concrete and steel. Achieving both goals with existing machinery is a contradiction. You cannot scale harvesting without scaling the environmental damage that comes with current methods.

AirForestry's technology could resolve this tension by enabling more frequent, less destructive thinning operations. Healthy thinning improves forest growth rates, increases carbon sequestration in remaining trees, and produces commercial timber. If aerial harvesting can perform these operations at competitive cost without the soil damage, it creates a genuine alignment between economic return and ecological stewardship.

The climate case is reinforced by the machine's electric powertrain. Where conventional harvesters burn diesel, AirForestry's system runs on electricity, eliminating tailpipe emissions and reducing the total carbon footprint of each harvesting operation.

Building physical machines is harder than building software. The development cycles are longer, the capital requirements are steeper, and the failure modes are more expensive. AirForestry is taking on all of these challenges in a demanding operating environment: forests with variable terrain, unpredictable weather, and trees that do not behave like standardized inputs.

But the Nordic region has a track record of producing hardware companies that crack difficult physical problems. Einride built autonomous electric trucks. Northvolt built battery gigafactories. Oura turned a ring into a health platform. The common thread is taking a massive legacy industry, identifying a fundamental technology gap, and engineering a system-level solution rather than an incremental improvement.

AirForestry fits this pattern. The forestry industry generates over $600 billion annually worldwide. The core machinery has not changed meaningfully in four decades. The environmental and regulatory pressure to change is intensifying. And the company has Northzone's chairman personally vouching for the technology's readiness.

The pre-commit structure of this round is notable. It is not a traditional equity round but a convertible note that will convert into the upcoming Series A at terms to be determined. This gives AirForestry runway to continue development without locking in a valuation at a stage where the technology's commercial proof points are still emerging.

The 12 planned hires span field engineers, automation specialists, and systems engineers, the kind of talent that is notoriously difficult to recruit for hardware startups competing with automotive and aerospace employers for the same skill sets. Stockholm's deep engineering talent pool, fed by KTH Royal Institute of Technology and Chalmers, gives AirForestry a structural advantage in this race.

If field validation goes well, the full Series A will likely close later in 2026, potentially at a significantly higher valuation. For now, AirForestry has what it needs: capital, conviction from its lead investor, and a CEO who is building the team to turn a proven concept into a commercial product. The forests are waiting.