who we are.

Pioneers of the Stratosphere

our story.

From a barn in upstate New York, Henry Kwan founded Icarus in 2023 after building autonomous drones at NASA and designing spacecraft to build factories in space. There, he saw firsthand how Space is constrained by orbital mechanics.

He started from first principles, sketching systems, running the numbers, and designing a new kind of platform: a solar-powered aircraft that could fly for months at the edge of space. Then he packed up his 1996 Ford Bronco, drove to California, and assembled a team to build it.

In 2024, that vision became APOLLO, our first fully solar-powered, autonomous aircraft. It flew. It worked. No hype, just hardware in the sky.

Now we’re scaling the team, the systems, and the mission. Not to chase what’s next, but to build what should already exist.

company tenets.

First Principles


Truth seeking from fundamentals

Mission Driven


Win or be forgotten

Relentless Iteration


Radical transparency & idea meritocracy

icarus elite sports team.

backed by world-class investors.

Paul Graham

be where history is made.

  • Los Angeles, CA

    Icarus designs, manufactures, and assembles its solar-powered stratospheric birds at our headquarters in Los Angeles, California. Our Los Angeles facility is the engineering, manufacturing, and business nerve center of Icarus. One of the few places on Earth where an entire stratospheric drone is designed, built, and brought to life under one roof.

  • Mojave Desert

    Icarus tests its stratospheric birds at our flight development and testing area in the Mojave Desert, California. Spanning wide-open airspace and rugged terrain, the site is built for rapid testing, iteration, and validation of full flight systems. From launch to recovery, every major system is proven here before operational deployment.

No Tourists. No Bystanders. Only Builders. Apply Now.

contact us.

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No bureaucracy. No waiting. Let's go.