SpaceAge Labs raises US$1.25 million in seed funding to make cities cleaner, greener and safer

SINGAPORE,March 1,2022 --"Growing populations,increased urbanisation,rising labour costs,lack of skilled workers,high safety standards and social distancing stipulations – various factors have come together resulting in the strong need for remote monitoring and IoT/AI solutions. This is why we set up SpaceAge Labs – to help organisations improve the way they are managing their widespread assets for improved efficiency,reliability and safety," explained Mr Deepak Pitta,founder and CEO,SpaceAge Labs.

Others obviously believe in Deepak's vision. SpaceAge Labs today revealed it has secured seed funding of US$1.25 million,led by Silicon Solution Partners (SSP),a VC firm supporting deep tech start-ups,and SEEDS Capital,the investment arm of Enterprise Singapore. SpaceAge Labs 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. Planetspark,a wholly-owned subsidiary of SGX mainboard listed Excelpoint Technology Ltd. is also working closely with SpaceAge Labs to accelerate their technology,alongside investing in this seed round. SpaceAge Labs will use this funding to grow its team,expand internationally,and roll out pilot projects across Singapore,Australia,and the U.S.

"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.

Revolutionising monitoring

SpaceAge Labs is a deep tech start-up that was incubated at NUS Enterprise @Singapore Science Park. It is revolutionising 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. This increases the asset's uptime (due to data-driven predictive maintenance),reduces cost (less manpower required) and provides peace of mind (operators gain real-time asset visibility).

The company's flagship product is remoteEye,a complete,sensor-agnostic IoT/AI platform that enables connected operations and maintenance. remoteEye consists of three parts:

rEye IoT Nodes – low-powered,wireless devices that read and transmit data from industrial sensors located at the assets.

Wireless networks – sensor data is transmitted via low power wide area wireless networks to the cloud. The networks are atlow cost (< $1 per month per device),able to transmit over long distances (several kilometres) and consume low power (up to five years of battery life).

rEye Data Cloud – enterprise-grade IoT/AI software stores,analyses,and visualises this sensor data. This software is secure,easy to use and able to scale from managing one to thousands of assets. Proprietary AI software and geospatial data analysis provides useful insights and predictions that can be accessed via web or mobile.

SpaceAge Labs is targeting three sectors: Water/Wastewater; Urban Greenery/Landscaping; and Facilities management. SpaceAge Labs has IoT deployments with more than 30 customers,including two Smart Nation pilot projects in Singapore. In the first project,SpaceAge Labs worked with the National Parks Board (NParks) to ensure their contractors were completing grass-cutting operations effectively. IoT devices were worn on the hips of grass-cutters,or installed on equipment such as sit-on mowers. These sensors transmitted data on the height of post-cut grass. Together with GPS location data,NParks could easily verify the completion and quality of grass-cutting operations across Singapore. In the second project,SpaceAge Labs collaborated with the Public Utilities Board (PUB) to monitor and prevent sewer overflows in Singapore's wastewater network. SpaceAge Labs installed 40 IoT devices in sewer manholes in three different areas. These devices provided PUB with real-time alerts when waste water levels rose too high. When alerted,PUB could check for blockages downstream,before overflow occurred,avoiding infrastructure damage,as well as public safety and environmental health issues. The real-time monitoring solution also informed PUB of areas that are likely to get blocked in the future,so proactive,preventative action could be taken. Over a 12-month period,SpaceAge Labs successfully alerted PUB to 10 events,which were promptly cleared resulting in no overflow.

Seed funding to be used for new pilots and company expansion

SpaceAge Labs will continue more pilots,demonstrating the benefits of its remoteEye IoT solution,as well as to find new customers and partners. In first half of 2022,SpaceAge Labs will conduct pilots with landscaping companies in Australia,to improve efficiencies of their grass-cutting work in Brisbane and Sydney. If successful,it could lead to nation-wide deployments. 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 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 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. to reach our target audience better," explained Mr Deepak Pitta.

SpaceAge Labs' entrepreneurial journey

Deepak founded SpaceAge Labs in 2016,with co-founders Mr Ananth Subba (Chief Technology Officer,who is currently based in Australia),Mr Leela Krishna (Chief Business Officer) and Mr Sashikumar Y (Chief Product Officer). In 2017,SpaceAge Labs became an NUS Enterprise incubatee,based within NUS its deep-tech incubation facility in Singapore Science Park I,where access to hardware,a prototyping lab,and networks to potential partners and customers helped tremendously.

SpaceAge Labs collaborated with the NUS Office of Facilities Management team to trial the first version of its remoteEye IoT solution. This trial was conducted to detect faulty streetlights on the NUS campus,leading to improved safety for pedestrians and drivers at night. In 2020,SpaceAge Labs moved to its own unit at PUB's Singapore Water Exchange,to accommodate its growing size and be closer to the water industry ecosystem,one of its key target verticals.

For more information,please visit https://www.spaceage-labs.com/