Planette, a climate tech startup that just graduated from Techstars Seattle’s latest accelerator, has raised $2.4 million.
Planette’s AI-boosted technology is designed to help businesses plan for weather and climate risks that could impact resources and operations.
There are a flurry of other weather forecasting startups but Planette says it differentiates by focusing on “near-term forecasts” — producing quarterly or seasonal reports, for example, versus week-to-week forecasts or longer-term climate predictions.
The Bay Area startup is led by co-founders Dr. Hansi Singh and Dr. Kalai Ramea. The two have expertise in climate and atmospheric sciences, AI, machine learning, and quantitative modeling.
Singh, the CEO, is a past professor of physical climate science at the University of Victoria. She received her PhD and masters from the University of Washington and was previous a fellow at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Ramea, the CTO, is the former associate director of the Palo Alto Research Center who received her PhD in quantitative modeling from the University of California, Davis.
“Planette provides the critical foundational intelligence needed for climate change adaptation,” the company said in its Techstars Demo Day pitch in January. “Our forecasts provide detailed year-to-year granularity, at 25-km resolution covering the globe, through a convenient, easy-to-access data API ready to incorporate into existing operational workflows.”
Planette has gained early stage traction in the energy and utilities sector, with three letters of intent, a pilot with the largest public municipal utility in the U.S., and negotiations for a partnership with the United Nations.
“The reason I decided to invest in Hansi and Kalai was because of their incredible science and AI engineering skills,” Marius Ciocirlan, managing director of Techstars Seattle, said in a news release. “Their ability to develop storytelling and sales strategies, alongside their technical expertise, significantly impacted their fundraising success.”
There are a number of startups aiming to offer better weather and climate predictions, including WindBorne Systems, which announced Wednesday that it surpassed DeepMind in prediction capability.
AI can create faster weather forecasts but some experts remain skeptical that it will replace traditional forecasting models.
The funding round was led by Audacious Ventures, with participation from Jetstream, Dash Fund, and Graham & Walker.
This year’s Techstars Seattle cohort featured 24 startups which spent three months honing their business models and go-to-market strategies, with the help of four entrepreneurs-in-residence — Bill Bryant, general partner at Threshold Ventures; OfferUp co-founder Arean Van Veelan; Shyft co-founder Chris Pitchford; and Loftium co-founder Yifan Zhang — along with more than 100 mentors.
