SA start-ups Ping and Daitum win Federal Government grants
Two South Australian start-ups will share in more than $400,000 in funding as part of the latest round of Federal Government commercialisation grants.
- AI start-up Daitum wins $1 million prize from VC fund
- Global interest in SA-designed wind farm listening device
Two South Australian start-ups will share in more than $400,000 in funding as part of the latest round of Federal Government commercialisation grants.
Acoustic software company Ping Services has been awarded $170,000 to help commercialise its wind turbine monitoring system, while AI company Daitum has secured $240,000 to help develop its AI-backed analytics software application.
Ping has spent the past six years developing its Ping Monitor device, which uses acoustic analysis to help detect wind turbine blade damage, in turn alerting operators of the need to undertake maintenance and repairs.
The device uses Myriota’s satellite communications, allowing for the transfer of data from remote sites.
Chief executive Matthew Stead said the company would use the funds to trial, upscale, connect and launch the device into domestic and international markets.
“Over the last six years we’ve been developing this innovation which we believe will create a seismic shift in how wind farms operate and which could save big operators hundreds of thousands of dollars per year,” he said.
“Trials have been run with large commercial partners to run prototype field trials, analytics and fault detection algorithm testing in the US and Europe.
“The team at Ping is very excited about winning the funding and will increase the number of international trials we are running with large wind farm operators.”
Meanwhile, Daitum director Ian Scriven said his company would use the funding to develop new features in its cloud-based platform, which makes AI and machine learning accessible to users in areas such as mining, asset management and health.
The “self-service decision analytics” platform matches a customer’s business problem with algorithms aimed at deriving the optimum solution to the problem.
“We have paying customers now in various parts of Australia, but what we’re trying to get to over the next 12 months, is to provide access to the platform without users needing to be experts on the technology,” he said.
“The end goal is self-service, where users can go online, buy it and start using it without needing professionals to help and provide ongoing advice.”
Mr Scriven said the company was currently interviewing for up to five new roles including in sales and marketing, software engineering and business analysis.
In December, Daitum out-pitched more than 600 start-ups across Asia, winning $1 million in venture capital funding as part of the Pitch for $1 Million competition.
The company, which was established a little more than a year ago, is one of the foundation tenants at Lot Fourteen where it employs eight staff.
The latest round of Accelerating Commercialisation grants provided a total of $5.4 million in Federal Government grants to support 12 businesses across the country.