Overwatch AI Raises $1.5M to Reduce Flight Disruptions

May 20, 2026
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Overwatch AI (Techstars 2025), a platform helping the pilots, cabin crew, and operations managers working on the frontlines of aviation to quickly find critical information and make fast, efficient operational decisions, has closed a $1.5M pre-seed funding round.

Cutting Through the Noise of Aviation Operations

Airline teams make crucial decisions before, during, and after every flight to ensure safety, compliance, and operational efficiency. Today, that often means navigating thousands of documents across dozens of fragmented systems to find the information needed to act.

Founded in July 2025 by former airline pilot Leo Kotil and technology entrepreneur Nikita Kaeshko, Overwatch AI brings these disparate sources together into one user-friendly platform. Pilots, crew, and ground staff use natural language to support operational decision-making across technical issues, airport and airline requirements, and weather assessments. Every answer is grounded in official documentation or data and fully sourced, so aviation teams can act with confidence.

The platform is already in live use across multiple airlines, handling more than 30,000 flights per month, saving each team member 150 hours a year and airlines up to $4M annually on average. Teams using Overwatch AI see a 4.6x increase in compliant decision-making and a 6.6% increase in overall crew productivity.

"After nearly a decade as a pilot, I know how painfully disjointed many of the pre- and in-flight processes are. You are trawling through various apps and systems based on outdated software, trying to piece together the information you need to take action. You spend more time on this than flying the plane. It creates a complete information overload and can cause massive delays. Overwatch AI cuts through this noise," says Leo Kotil, CEO and co-founder of Overwatch AI.

"The AI does the hard work of trawling through the reams of documentation and dozens of operational data sources, making sense of it and connecting the dots, surfacing the answers and insights airline teams are looking for. In an industry where safety and accuracy is paramount, we are very proud of how impactful our technology is already being — both on the ground and in the air — when it comes to improving safety, efficiency and operational performance across aviation."

What's Next

The new funding will allow Overwatch AI to:

  • Scale the team,

  • Expand the operational capabilities of the platform to meet growing industry demand,

  • Scale service delivery and roll the system out to more airlines in the coming months.

Learn more about Overwatch AI.