FogHorn Systems, a leading developer of 'edge intelligence' software for industrial and commercial Internet of Things (IoT) applications, announced today that it has raised $12 million in Series A funding led by March Capital and GE Ventures. Additional Series A funding was provided by Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH, Yokogawa Electric Corporation and Darling Ventures. The company also converted an additional $2.5 million of initial seed capital provided by March Capital and The Hive, the Palo Alto-based AI and big data studio that co-created FogHorn.
FogHorn is a leader in the rapidly emerging domain of edge intelligence (or 'fog computing') for industrial and commercial IoT applications. The company's breakthrough fog computing software platform is a critical enabler for a new class of powerful real-time analytics, machine learning models and edge computing applications in a wide variety of industrial and enterprise use cases.
'This is the largest initial round of funding raised by a Silicon Valley startup focused on IoT edge analytics and fog computing,' said FogHorn CEO David C. King. 'Our investors include major strategic players in the Industrial IoT sector with participation from global leaders based in North America, Europe and the Asia Pacific region. In addition to welcoming these companies as strategic investment partners, we will work with each of them to develop breakthrough IoT solutions for their industrial and commercial customers.'
'The Industrial Internet enables organizations to leverage and act on analytic insights from their machines, equipment, and operations. Realizing this vision requires distributed edge-to-cloud computing and machine learning, and we are excited to have leading technology innovators like FogHorn as part of our Predix ecosystem,' said Michael Dolbec, head of ventures and business development for GE Digital.
FogHorn's technology enables high-performance edge processing, real-time analytics and heterogeneous machine learning applications to be hosted as closely as possible to the source of high-volume and high-velocity operations technology (OT) machine data. This unique solution provides customers with unprecedented capabilities that enable them to achieve greater operating efficiencies (increases in runtime, throughput and yield, or reductions in machine outages, scrap material and energy usage) and to detect anomalous conditions that can impact individual asset or site-wide performance.
Industry sectors where this high-performance, real-time edge analytics technology can unlock billions of dollars in economic value include manufacturing, power and water utilities, oil and gas production, mining, renewable energy, transportation and health care, as well as smart grids, smart cities, smart buildings and connected vehicles. The vast amount of data produced every day by the machines in these settings dictates the use of an edge-centric computing paradigm that not only minimizes bandwidth costs but also addresses latency, reliability, security and privacy issues.
'Bosch has been a leader in bringing the transformative power of IoT to a wide range of industrial environments through our prominent role in the creation of Industry 4.0,' said Luis Llovera, Managing Director of Robert Bosch LLC. 'The market opportunity for IoT is vast, not only in the industrial sector, but in Bosch's smart building and connected vehicle businesses as well. We look forward to working with FogHorn's groundbreaking edge analytics technology and fog computing applications platform.'
FogHorn's industrial IoT software stack is a combination of technologies providing an efficient and highly scalable end-to-end solution that blends the benefits of real-time, on-site processing of sensor data from industrial machines with cloud-based management, analysis, and machine learning. In addition to applying intelligence at the edge where IoT devices operate, the FogHorn platform significantly lowers cloud-related bandwidth costs by refocusing the role of the cloud to very specific functions such as application portability and provisioning orchestration, machine learning and advanced cloud/edge analytics.
'Ingesting sensor data at the edge and then simply publishing everything to a cloud environment for processing is not practical or advisable in most industrial settings,' said FogHorn CTO Sastry Malladi. 'The sheer amount of data generated by industrial machines and factories can easily exceed available bandwidth, and it would be cost prohibitive to send that data to the cloud. Moreover, some machines and processes require automated responses within a few seconds or even milliseconds. By the time uploaded data is processed in a data center and the results transferred back to the edge, it often arrives too late. This is where FogHorn's edge intelligence is truly revolutionary.'
FogHorn's technology has been embraced by the world's leading industrial Internet solutions companies as well as major players in cloud computing, high-performance edge gateways and IoT systems integration.
About FogHorn Systems
FogHorn is a leading developer of 'edge intelligence' software for industrial and commercial IoT applications. FogHorn's software platform brings the power of machine learning and advanced analytics to the on-premise edge environment, enabling a new class of applications for advanced monitoring and diagnostics, asset performance optimization, operational intelligence and predictive maintenance use cases. FogHorn's solutions are ideally suited for OEMs, systems integrators and end customers in vertical markets such as manufacturing, power and water, oil and gas, mining, transportation, healthcare, retail, as well as smart grid, smart city, smart building and connected vehicle use cases.
http://www.foghorn-systems.com
About March Capital Partners
March Capital Partners invests in both early and late-stage private companies primarily in the next generation enterprise and infrastructure markets. Recognized as the leading technology venture firm in Southern California, March Capital has a global investment mandate. March's founders possess over 60 years of investment experience and helped to build a series of iconic technology companies. March Capital Partners typically leads its investments and is extremely pleased to be a lead investor for FogHorn's Series A funding round. Sumant Mandal and James Montgomery from March Capital Partners will serve on the FogHorn board.
http://www.marchcp.com
About GE Ventures
GE Ventures is committed to identifying, scaling and accelerating ideas that will make the world work better. Focused on the areas of software, advanced manufacturing, energy and healthcare, GE Ventures helps entrepreneurs and start-ups succeed by providing access to GE's technical expertise, capital and opportunities for commercialization through GE's global network of business, customers and partners. GE Ventures offers an unparalleled level of resources through its Global Research Center, including: 35,000 engineers; 5,000 research scientists; 8,000 software professionals; as well as 40,000 sales, marketing and development resources in over 100 countries.
http://www.geventures.com
About Robert Bosch Venture Capital
Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC) is the corporate venture capital company of the Bosch Group, a leading global supplier of technology and services. RBVC invests worldwide in innovative start-up companies at all stages of their development. Its investment activities focus on technology companies working in areas of business of current and future relevance for Bosch, above all, automation and electrification, energy efficiency, enabling technologies, and healthcare systems. RBVC also invests in services and business models as well as new materials that are relevant to the above-mentioned areas of business.
http://www.rbvc.com
About Yokogawa
Yokogawa's global network of 92 companies spans 59 countries. Founded in 1915, the US$3.7 billion company engages in cutting-edge research and innovation. Yokogawa is active in the industrial automation and control (IA), test and measurement, and aviation and other businesses segments. The IA segment plays a vital role in a wide range of industries including oil, chemicals, natural gas, power, iron and steel, pulp and paper, pharmaceuticals, and food. http://www.yokogawa.com
About Darling Ventures
Darling Ventures is a micro cap venture capital firm providing seed and early stage funding to technology startups throughout the US. Investing out of its second fund, the firm looks for highly technical teams building businesses in the data intelligence and mobile technology space. Investment sizes range between $100K and $500K with greater capital reserved for follow-on funding.
http://darlingventures.com/
About The Hive
The Hive is a studio that creates and launches startups and provides capital, company-building and technological resources to bring companies to market. The Hive believes that innovation in data technologies will help create a new generation of applications that will disrupt markets and create new business opportunities. Founded in 2012 The Hive is headquartered in Palo Alto with related entities in India and soon in other regions of the world. The Hive runs a Big Data Think Tank, a community of over 8,500 entrepreneurs, business professionals and technologists who gather for weekly forum events to share thought leadership, knowledge and trends in Big Data.
http:/www.hivedata.com