COMPREDICT, a German startup specialising in AI-enabled software solutions for predictive maintenance, vehicle health and usage monitoring, has nabbed $5.5 million in Series A funding. This round was led by Vektor Partners, a mobility-focused VC firm, and BlackBerry Limited.
Scaleup plans
As a strategic investor BlackBerry will support COMPREDICT’s growth and product portfolio through its BlackBerry IVY Innovation Fund. This fund was built in partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and it simplifies the company’s ability to manage large scale OEM deployments of its in-vehicle predictive maintenance and diagnostics algorithms.
The funds will be used to scale its AI predictive platform for automotive health and usage monitoring. It will also use the funding to deepen its collaboration with automakers and fleet providers, as well as expand into new markets.
Stéphane Foulard, COMPREDICT’s CEO said: “We are more than happy to welcome not only two new shareholders but two new strong partners on board. As a strategic investor, BlackBerry delivers synergies with its IVY platform, which provides a competitive advantage by allowing us to seamlessly integrate our virtual sensors directly into vehicles.”
Sebastian Bihari, General Partner at Vektor Partners, said: “The beauty of COMPREDICT’s technology is that it can replace physical sensors in vehicles, generate insights that physical sensors cannot, and eventually can provide redundancy in situations where a physical sensor fails. The team can look back on a strong track record in working with automakers globally already and we are looking forward to joining COMPREDICT on their journey of growth.”
Anooj Shah, Senior Director, Investments & Strategy at BlackBerry, said: “COMPREDICT’s industry-leading virtual sensing technology combined with deep automotive domain expertise matches BlackBerry IVY’s vision of enabling advanced vehicle data insights for automakers and the broader mobility ecosystem. We are thrilled to bring them into the BlackBerry IVY ecosystem to support their mission of making accurate predictive maintenance and vehicle diagnostics more accessible and enable automakers to transform these insights into new service offerings.”
Marc Pasquet, Director of the Services & Solutions Business Line, Michelin, added: “COMPREDICT’s new fundraising is a confirmation of its technology and growth potentials. As a partner and early investor, MICHELIN is looking forward to continuing the collaboration with COMPREDICT on connected solutions for fleet management.”
Virtual sensors for sustainable mobility
COMPREDICT was founded by Rafael Fietzek and Stéphane Foulard in 2016 in Darmstadt, Germany. The company encourages sustainable mobility and operates with the mission to transfer vehicle data into vehicle insights. It considers vehicle health and usage monitoring as an essential part of a sustainable vehicle lifecycle to maximise utilisation and minimise environmental footprint.
Its innovative virtual sensors enable fleet operators and vehicle manufacturers (OEMs) to gain a deeper insight into how their vehicles’ safety-critical components are used. Also, the company’s intuitive cloud-based Analytics Dashboard provides a holistic view of a vehicle’s health and estimates the lifespan of brakes, tires or batteries to identify issues early and cut down on expensive warranty and maintenance costs.
COMPREDICT’s unique approach combines automotive and durability domain expertise with data science and allows value-added insights on both wearable and non-wearable automotive components.
