Construction and Mining AI Startup Secures $5m Funding

Business » INDUSTRY | July 10, 2019, Wednesday // 18:46
Bulgaria: Construction and Mining AI Startup Secures $5m Funding

When most people in the general public think of autonomous vehicles, they think of the self-driving cars and the potential for autonomous taxis (wouldn’t Uber be so much better if there weren’t any humans involved?). However, another technological revolution has been slowly brewing on the sidelines. And now, another startup catering specifically to the mining sector, SafeAI, has secured an initial round of investment. Not only that, but they have got the $5 million that they needed to get their operation launched in earnest.

Mining Automation

SafeAI has already struck a deal with Doosan Bobcat. The South Korean equipment giant is a major player in the construction and mining industries in the US. Their partnership could produce some very interesting results.

SafeAi has been conducting tests in partnership with Bobcat at their base in San Jose. The fledgling business is hopeful that one day its AI products could be powering a whole range of mining and construction equipment.

Autonomous Workforce

Automation in the workplace is nothing new, but this automation has been hidden from consumers. We all know that there are robots in our factories, but those of us who have never worked in a factory haven’t seen them up close. The technological advances being made in the field of autonomous vehicles are not restricted to the self-driving cars that Google has teased.

Fleet Tracking Solutions

Data is at the heart of all automation and vehicle intelligence systems. Take EnVue Telematics as an example. Their fleet management solutions make integrating existing logistics systems much easier and enables real-time monitoring of an entire fleet. This means that a business can track the status of their vehicles, reduce fleet costs with better fuel management, adhere to DOT compliance, and ensure everything is running smoothly.

Underlying Architecture

The belief of SafeAi that AI has an important role to play in the safety of construction and mining sites of the future is not without precedent. We are only beginning to scratch the surface of what machine-learning can accomplish. SafeAi believes that they can ultimately produce AI solutions that are able to reliably replace human decision-making.

Whether that AI is driving a vehicle, a fleet or a mining drill, computers can take in and process an enormous amount of information. SafeAi doesn’t yet have a product on the market, although they are hopeful that their partnership with Bobcat will change that. That they have still secured $5 million in funding without any apparent fanfare is indicative of the confidence that equipment companies have in AI solutions.

While they don’t market a product to consumers yet, SafeAi’s technology has already been fitted to vehicles. Most businesses involved in the mining sector have accepted that automation is going to be a major feature of the workplace going forward. The construction sector is having a similar realization.

With a number of investors behind them - Autotech Ventures, Embark Ventures and a number of other venture capital firms - SafeAi clearly have the backing of many key players.

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