Skydio, LivePlan, Canix, OutSchool, RoboticCats, Noir
Another great New Tech on November 4 featuring Skydio, Palo Alto Software / LivePlan, Canix, OutSchool, RoboticCats, and Noir. The recording above. A written snapshot below. Thank you to our presenters and audience.
Palo Alto Software: Palo Alto Software was originally founded in Palo Alto, the heart of Silicon Valley, but has since relocated to Eugene, Oregon. CEO Sabrina Parsons presented the company’s software tools, including their flagship product LivePlan, which aids small businesses to plan, fund, and grow. Other signature products they offer are Outpost, which helps manage email and collaboration within a team, and Bplans.com, a deep and wide online content site focused on business planning. Palo Alto Software started as a small business and is now over four decades old, so the team knows what it takes to grow a successful company.
Skydio: Skydio is the leading US drone manufacturer and is headquartered just over the hill in Redwood City. Fritz Reber, Head of Public Safety Integration, showcased the startup that is currently closing a $100M Series C fundraising round. They are building exciting products for consumers (Skydio 2) and enterprise customers (Skydio X2). Because of their multiple onboard cameras and autonomous Skydio Beacon controller, the drones are easier to pilot. The Skydio 2 can be seen following sportspersons on surfing, mountain biking, and skiing expeditions. Including at night, Skydio X2 flies even longer and can fly over dangerous areas such as forests to detect wildfires.
Canix: Co-Founder and CEO of Canix, a member of the recent Y Combinator Summer 2019 batch, Stacy Hronowski works with a small team to build an exciting new enterprise resource planning tool for cannabis companies. Cannabis companies laboriously record individual plant tracking notes on paper, but Canix simplifies the process with a mobile app that scans the plant barcodes. Canix’s strong technical engineering team and comprehensive feature set has allowed the company to quickly establish a customer base in four states and will soon expand to a total of 13 states and Canada, making a huge impact in the cannabis industry.
Noir Lighting: COO Daniel Stone explained that typical infrared sensing technology for light switches falls short in many ways. Noir’s radar sensing technology can detect room occupancy with higher accuracy and sensitivity than any other products on the market. It can be used for a number of interesting applications such as allowing property owners to save costs on energy to provide insights on when a space needs to be sanitized after usage, in order to slow the spread of the COVID-19 virus. Located in Gilbert Arizona, Noir is currently raising capital to help build out the software side of their solution.
Outschool: Outschool is a San Francisco based company that offers affordable classes for kids aged 3-18 years old. They prioritize small group learning -- just 2-5 kids plus a teacher on zoom. Teachers are able to set their own prices, creating an individualized marketplace for students looking to learn online. With over 2 million learner hours from students in 200 countries, Outschool is a major player in the virtual education landscape! Outschool is providing an innovative and personalized solution for online learning. Erin Girard is an experienced teacher and parent who has taught many classes on Outschool over the past few years.
Robotics Cats: Andre Cheung, CEO and Founder of Robotics CATs (Computer vision, AI, IOT), presented the company’s camera-based wildfire sensing robot, which can detect smoke up to nine miles away with its unique machine learning and optical detection algorithms. The robots are usually purchased by government agencies (wildfire fighting organizations, national parks) and are installed on existing fire towers. Robotics Cats mobile application, ReportFires, is the world’s first AI wildfire detection app that allows users to utilize the company’s computer vision algorithms to detect wildfires from their cell phone camera and provides real time notifications of nearby fires.