IoT/AI solutions provider, SpaceAge secures seed funding of $1.25 million led by Silicon Solution Partners (SSP), a Singapore-based VC firm supporting deep tech startups, and SEEDS Capital, the investment arm of Enterprise Singapore.
The startup is also supported by NUS Enterprise, the entrepreneurial arm of the National University of Singapore (NUS), Imagine H2O (a water innovation accelerator) and PUB’s Singapore Water Exchange. The wholly owned subsidiary of SGX mainboard listed Excelpoint Technology Ltd., Planetspark is also a partner working closely with SpaceAge Labs to help accelerate their technology alongside joining the round as an investor. Sunil Rai and Shivam Ahuja from Dentos Rodyk & Davidson LLP served as the legal advisors to SpaceAge Labs in this seed round.
“We view SpaceAge Labs as having a strong and experienced technical team with successful use cases in the deployment of cost-competitive IoT solutions, with both a hardware and software platform to improve the real time monitoring and manpower productivity enhancement in traditional eco real estate management. This will further expand their business traction into other commercial segments as well,” said David Ng, CEO of SSP.
“SpaceAge Lab’s innovative solutions, which are designed to help businesses in water and landscaping services to monitor their outdoor and remote assets, could potentially help drive their digitalization journey in the new normal as they create operational efficiencies and additional revenue streams. We look forward to supporting SpaceAge Lab on their commercialization journey, alongside our co-investor Silicon Solutions Partners,” said Ms Tan Kaixin, General Manager, SEEDS Capital.
SpaceAge will use the fund to grow its team, expand internationally and roll out several pilot projects across Singapore, Australia and the US.
“Growing populations, increased urbanisation, rising labour costs, lack of skilled workers, high safety standards and social distancing stipulations – various factors have been coming together resulting in the strong need for remote monitoring and IoT/AI solutions. This is why we set up SpaceAge Labs – to help governments and corporations improve the way they are managing their widespread assets for improved efficiency, reliability and safety,” explained Deepak Pitta, founder and CEO of SpaceAge Labs, which is disrupting operations and maintenance of remote and distributed assets by collecting asset data using low power, long-range wireless IoT devices together with advanced AI software to generate valuable insights from this data. Its flagship product remoteEye is a complete, sensor-agnostic IoT/AI platform that enables connected operations and maintenance.
This 2016-founded company will continue to embark on more pilots, demonstrate the benefits of its remoteEye IoT solution, as well as find new customers and partners. In first half of 2022, SpaceAge Labs will conduct pilots with landscaping companies in Australia, to help improve efficiencies of their grass-cutting work in Brisbane and Sydney. Similar landscaping pilots will be conducted in the U.S. in the latter half of 2022. In Singapore, SpaceAge Labs plans to conduct several pilots, which will monitor water consumption patterns and detect leaks in facilities, monitor weather/air quality in outdoor spaces, monitor water quality in swimming pools and water play areas, and monitor remote mechanical/ electrical equipment, such as decentralised water treatment skids and water tankers.
“We hope to conduct more pilot trials with companies and governments, to showcase how remoteEye results in benefits including cost savings, improved safety/hygiene levels, improved performance and reduced reliance on manpower. In order to do so, we will need to increase our headcount and expand internationally. Currently, our team consists of 12 people, mainly in Singapore, though one of our co-founders has moved to Australia to supervise the pilots there. Over the next 6-12 months, we plan to double our headcount, requiring people in Product Development and Sales & Marketing functions. We also hope to open international offices in Australia and the U.S. in order to reach our target audience better,” explained Deepak.
