Enechange Insight Program Selects VIA For Inaugural Cohort

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VIA is proud to be one of 21 companies selected as part of the inaugural ENECHANGE Insight Ventures (EIV) cohort. Each company selected for the cohort brings unique tools to help Japan achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. According to EIV, companies were selected based on their “technology, size, market traction, timeframe for a prospective collaboration, and subscribers’ interest.” 

Learn more about Enechange and our fellow cohort members on their website.

VIA Strengthens Presence in Western Europe with Swiss Office and Local Advisor

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The AI platform innovator selected intelligent building center of excellence Zug and will expand research work with HSLU

ZUG, Switzerland, June 9, 2021 — VIA, a global trailblazer in AI and privacy-preserving software for the energy industry, today announced it has opened an office in Switzerland, further cementing its role in the acceleration of Switzerland’s clean energy transition goals. The new office, strategically located in the canton of Zug, will support the company’s growth across the European Union, including France, Germany, and Austria. VIA chose the Switzerland Innovation Park Central as it is the preeminent intelligent building innovation hub.

“Switzerland is a global leader in clean energy adoption. The country also carries some of the world’s strictest privacy regulations. Its goal to eliminate greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 is ambitious, and we are excited to be part of making it achievable,” said Kate Ravanis, Chief Operating Officer and Swiss Board Member at VIA. “Our team will play an important role in equipping the Swiss energy sector with the technology to overcome barriers to data and protect privacy, and are excited to bring our patented blockchain application, Trusted Analytics Chain™ to the Crypto Valley.”

To enhance VIA’s operating capabilities, the company named local industry veteran, Andrew Bright, as advisor to the office. In this role, Mr. Bright, who joined VIA’s Advisory Board last year, will draw on his deep knowledge of the region and its unique energy and privacy challenges. He brings 25 years of experience in the sustainable energy and transportation sectors, including 12 years as a senior executive at ABB Power Grids.

VIA will expand its Swiss presence and partnership with Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (HSLU), focused primarily in the areas of data science, AI, and clean energy technology, and their interaction with the region’s strict data privacy laws. In 2020, VIA and HSLU won funding from the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (SFOE) for its KnowlEDGE project to develop edge computing capabilities on advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), enabling increased data privacy.

Liv Minder, Director Investment Promotion, Switzerland Global Enterprise added, “The clean energy industry has carved out a place in Switzerland, which in turn is providing strong impetus for growth. Given its mission to drive the adoption of clean energy, and leadership in the energy data privacy sector, VIA is warmly welcomed to our business ecosystem.”

VIA, which recently announced a $10M Series A investment round, anticipates key hires over the next several months as well as major customer and partner announcements. Follow the latest from VIA by visiting www.solvewithvia.com/latest/ or on social @solvewithvia.

About VIA

VIA is powering the clean energy revolution. Working with the world’s leading utilities, clean energy companies, and government agencies, VIA’s software overcomes the most common barriers to AI: lack of data, data quality issues, and data privacy concerns. As a result, VIA’s software accelerates the AI required for the clean energy transition. VIA also provides the bridge that enables EVs, battery storage, demand response, and distributed energy resources to be on the grid. VIA is headquartered in Somerville, Massachusetts, with a technology center in Montreal, Quebec. For more information, please visit www.solvewithvia.com.

BostInno Recognizes VIA as Leader in Boston Area

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VIA is proud to be locally recognized as a leader in the Boston area by BostInno, a Boston-based news site covering “innovation in technology and startups, VC and finance, higher education, and city life.”

With our recent funding milestone, BostInno listed us as one of 15 companies in the Boston area ready to take on exceptional growth. Check out their full article here.

BloombergNEF Highlights VIA as Data Procurement for AI Specialist

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VIA was recently mentioned in a report published by Amanda Ahl at BloombergNEF. The report titled, “Blockchain Opportunities in Power Still Abound,” discusses the total global addressable market for blockchain in the power sector and how it could surpass $100 billion in 2030. Applications for renewable energy certificates, cybersecurity, and AI are among the reasons for this potential growth. 

Graphic featured in BloombergNEF article, “Blockchain Opportunities in Power Still Abound”

Meet the Team: Jonathan Chirwa, Software Developer

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VIA’s Meet the Team blog series features Q&A-style interviews with our team members to learn what a typical work day looks like for each individual and some fun facts like their favorite foods.

What does a typical day at VIA look like for you?

My day always begins with a warm cup of coffee and sending a “good morning” message on Slack signaling my availability for the day. Then, I review yesterday’s work to help prioritize tasks for the day and I also attend two daily standup meetings with the team. After standup, I get to work! A typical day ranges in terms of tasks, from lone/pair programming, preparing a presentation/demo, or researching a technology to use in a feature, like OAuth2 framework to improve the security of our user management system in authorizing and authenticating users.

What project have you worked on at VIA that you are most proud of?

The first project I worked on at VIA was a logging project that improves program observability and helps developers easily debug. I’m proud to say that after completion of the project, other teams at VIA have been using it as part of their daily routine. I love that I was able to contribute to the whole team’s productivity early on at VIA.

What’s something everyone may not (but should!) know about working at VIA?

Since our work life has been remote in the last year, companies have been finding ways to motivate teams and keep company culture at the same, if not higher, level. I think our team has come up with a creative idea: VIA awards teammates with VIA-bucks (points) when something happens that is unique to working remotely like forgetting to unmute yourself or having your pet interrupt a video call. This has really eased the transition to online meetings. Pretty cool right? 🙂

What’s your favorite VIA memory?

My favorite memories at VIA are almost always from our team events. For example, our team played a game called “ling your language” where we listened to short clips of people speaking in different languages across the world and had to identify the language from a given set of options. During the game, I left it to my fellow team members who are from or have lived in parts of the world like the Middle East, Europe, Asia, North or South America, to identify the language in the clip. Vice versa, I would help more in identifying African languages.

Apart from earning some VIA-bucks (which we will redeem for a group event once we are back in person together), it reminded me of how diverse the VIA team is and how we work best when we are collaborating.

What makes VIA’s technology unique compared to others?

The idea of sharing code instead of data to compute some analytics is something I have never heard of, until I learned of VIA. In this world where data is gold but there are a lot of valid privacy and security concerns, our TAC™ technology is a game changing solution.

If you were given an extra hour in your day, what would you spend it doing?

Great question! If I were to live in a 25 hours/day Earth 2.0 world, I would spend that extra hour reading a good book. This may be spiritual, philosophical, historical or a how-to like Atomic Habits, which teaches useful techniques to develop new “good” habits and stop potentially “bad” habits.

What’s one fun fact that you have learned about clean energy that you didn’t know before joining VIA?

During my first week at VIA, I had several onboarding meetings with teammates ranging from discussions about social media to our tech stack. In one particular meeting, we covered the energy landscape. I was surprised and excited to learn that 2020 was the first year that clean energy was cheaper to produce than non-renewable/fossil energy.

We have to ask, what is your go-to food?

My go-to food is a beef burger. I haven’t mastered a homemade one yet, maybe because I tasted Montreal’s “Burger Royal” which set the bar too high.

Mergermarket Interviews Colin Gounden About the Future of VIA

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VIA’s CEO, Colin Gounden, was interviewed by Michael Schoeck of Mergermarket, a financial news and data firm that specializes in M&A intelligence. Colin talks about how our recent funding round will help us expand our reach to power providers, our data security standards, and more. 

The article is part of a subscription service offered by Mergermarket.

VIA Raises $10M in Milestone Series A Investment Round

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New Capital Investments Underscore the Platform Company’s Powerful Promise to Accelerate Clean Energy Adoption

SOMERVILLE, Mass., May 11, 2021 — VIA, a global trailblazer in AI and privacy-preserving software for the energy industry, announced today that it closed a $10 million Series A investment, more than doubling its valuation. VIA chose the Westly Group as its lead investor. This round will fuel the company’s next phase of growth, including hiring best-in-industry talent, expanding its customer base (particularly in the U.S. and Western Europe), and continuing to fast-track delivery of its groundbreaking software platform, in support of its clean energy mission.

The Westly Group was joined by a top five Silicon Valley-based enterprise software company, as well as Prefix Capital, a leading deep technology-focused venture capital firm.

“We founded VIA because of the urgent need for AI in the energy space. The grid simply cannot adopt 100% clean technologies without AI. Data access and privacy were always major hurdles – until VIA,” said Colin Gounden, CEO of VIA. “We’re exceptionally pleased to see our traction and results recognized. This investment will help us meet the exponentially growing customer demand for our platform in the power sector.”

VIA partners with governments, regulators, and power providers to deliver billions of dollars in energy every year to more than 100 million customers worldwide. Its current roster of customers includes energy sector leaders such as ConEd, Enel, and Hawaiian Electric. In addition, VIA has an ongoing evaluation with EPRI, a consortium of more than 400 utilities. With two issued patents and more than 12 pending, VIA’s first-of-its-kind, privacy-preserving AI platform, Trusted Analytics Chain™ (TAC™), also meets the highest DevSecOps standards, as evidenced by its fifth selection by the U.S. Department of Defense earlier this year. TAC™ makes AI available everywhere to enable reliable and consistent clean energy on the grid. 

“The Series A market today is more competitive than any time in the last 10 years. Companies really need to show significant momentum before closing their Series A,” explained Danny Cotter, partner at the Westly Group. “VIA has proven incredible commercial uptake with its innovative technologies in a traditionally conservative space by partnering with some of the largest power providers in the world.”

“Great founders build great companies that change the world and VIA has followed this path from inception,” added Byron Alsberg, founding partner at Prefix Capital. “This investment is further validation of the strength of VIA’s vision, team, and technology.”  

VIA anticipates key hires over the next several months as well as major customer and partner announcements. Follow the latest from VIA by visiting www.solvewithvia.com/latest/ or on social @solvewithvia.

About VIA

VIA is powering the clean energy revolution. Working with the world’s leading utilities, clean energy companies, and government agencies, VIA’s software overcomes the most common barriers to AI: lack of data, data quality issues, and data privacy concerns. As a result, VIA’s software accelerates the AI required for the clean energy transition. VIA also provides the bridge that enables EVs, battery storage, demand response, and distributed energy resources to be on the grid. Headquartered in Somerville, Massachusetts, with a technology center in Montreal, Quebec, VIA has been featured in Wired and Inc. Magazine for its leadership in technology innovation. For more information, please visit www.solvewithvia.com.

About The Westly Group

The Westly Group invests in smart energy and mobility and has 15 of the world’s larger energy and auto companies as investors. The firm has over $500M AUM and has had six companies go public including Tesla Motors and Luminar.

About Prefix Capital

Prefix Capital is a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage startups with transformational technologies, which can range from biotech and life sciences to next-generation mobility, energy, wireless, and infrastructure platforms to new computing and AI technologies. Prefix Capital’s investment track record includes large exits and portfolio companies that have gone on to raise hundreds of millions of dollars in follow-on capital. 

Series of Case Studies Taught at Harvard Business School Focus on VIA’s Story

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Last year, VIA was approached by Harvard Business School (HBS) professors, Juan Alcacer and Rembrand Koning, to be the focus of a series of HBS case studies to be taught as part of the core curriculum. 

The first case covers VIA’s decision to serve power providers as customers versus more obvious sectors like retail and financial services. The cases that follow cover VIA’s firm belief that AI has the ability to transform the historically conservative sector and play an instrumental role in the clean energy revolution.   

Juan Alcacer, the James J. Hill Professor of Business Administration at HBS talks about the motivation behind creating and teaching the case studies about VIA, “90% of new companies target the biggest markets like healthcare and financial services, that’s why they are so crowded. VIA was visionary in its choice to work with energy companies first.” 

He continued, “HBS is all about strategy and strategy is about making choices. VIA chose to see past prevailing wisdom and take a different path, one we think was bold, and believe others can learn from.”

VIA CEO Colin Gounden and COO Kate Ravanis (who are both co-founders) attended the virtual HBS class where the cases were presented for the first time.

VIA Invited to Speak on Virtual Round Table During BNEF Summit

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VIA’s CEO Colin Gounden has been invited to speak on a virtual round table during BloombergNEF’s Summit on April 13 and 14. The round table session titled, “Startups and Corporations Hosted by BloombergNEF and Plug and Play” will take place on April 14 from 3:00 – 4:00pm ET. Participants will talk about the challenges and opportunities in deploying their technologies with large corporate partners. To register for the event, visit: https://about.bnef.com/summit/newyork/.

VIA Partners with MIT on U.S. Air Force Contract

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VIA is pleased to announce that they have partnered with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) through MIT Innovation Initiative‘s Mission Innovation Program for a contract with the U.S. Air Force (USAF). The contract is part of USAF’s Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program, whose mission, according to their website, is to “support scientific excellence and technological innovation through the investment of Federal research funds in critical American priorities to build a strong national economy.” 

VIA and MIT will work together to use VIA’s Trusted Analytics Chain™ (TAC™) software to bridge data from one of USAF’s classified training programs to advanced commercial AI solutions, without comprising data security. 

“USAF training programs are rich with data, which AI can analyze, to produce unique insights. As you can imagine, this data is highly sensitive, so making it accessible to AI specialists outside of USAF has been a big challenge,” commented Joe Babiec, VIA’s SVP, Strategic Initiatives. 

He continued, “We’re proud to be working alongside MIT to help USAF connect to AI specialists while ensuring the security and privacy of training program data. Combining VIA’s unique technology with MIT’s AI expertise and experience collaborating with the United States Department of Defense (DoD) on confidential initiatives will yield great benefits for USAF.”

“MIT Innovation Initiative is excited to work with VIA on this project with the United States Air Force,” said MIT Innovation Initiative Executive Director, Gene Keselman. “VIA’s innovative new TAC™ software provides secure access to confidential and classified data for analysis. This ability to bring AI to the data can help the USAF tackle many challenging applications.” 

This is the fifth time VIA and its TAC™ software have been selected by USAF in the past 18 months, with the most notable contract signed in July 2020.

About VIA

VIA helps governments, regulators, and power providers deliver $200Bn in energy every year to more than 100 million customers. VIA’s privacy-preserving analytics software, Trusted Analytics Chain™ (TAC™) reduces the cost and improves the quality of service of electricity transmission and distribution using AI and blockchain technologies. TAC™ (patents pending) is the bridge that securely connects power company data, distributed across many locations, to potential AI solutions. VIA established the Global Data Asset Collaborative™ (GDAC™), built on top of TAC™, to allow multiple companies to securely pool data for more accurate analytics. Headquartered in Somerville, Massachusetts, VIA has been featured in Wired and Inc. Magazine for its leadership in technology innovation. For more information, please visit www.solvewithvia.com.

About MIT Innovation Initiative
Founded at MIT (https://web.mit.edu) in 2013, MIT Innovation Initiative is charged with delivering innovation to the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Ecosystem by identifying problems and creating solutions faster, more effectively, and at scale; and to focus and amplify MIT’s natural strength in innovation in service to the world. The organization is a team of unceasingly inquisitive, data-obsessed problem solvers—academics, business professionals, military, alumni, and community-builders—dedicated to stewarding the innovation process from idea to world-changing impact. Learn more: https://innovation.mit.edu and https://innovation.mit.edu/mission-innovation-program.

Contact:
David Sweeney
Director of Communications

dws1052@mit.edu 

 

VIA’s CEO Colin Gounden Invited to Speak at ASME Wind Digital Solutions Summit

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VIA’s CEO Colin Gounden has been invited to speak during the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) event: Wind Digital Solutions Summit. Colin will speak on April 20 at 1:00pm ET during the session titled, “Data Sharing and Access: Enabling Research & Innovation.” For more information and to register for the event, visit: https://event.asme.org/Wind-Digital

VIA Featured as Best Tech Startup in Somerville for Second Consecutive Year by The Tech Tribune

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For the second year in a row, VIA has been selected by The Tech Tribune as one of the Best Tech Startups in Somerville. According to their website, The Tech Tribune “delivers the latest technology news, in-depth technology articles, exclusive interviews with entrepreneurs, and insights on the hottest technology startups all over the world.”

The list includes ten companies in Somerville that provide solutions ranging from energy storage systems to deep learning models to robotics. 

VIA was included on this exclusive list last year and Kate Ravanis, COO and co-founder of VIA, was interviewed for The Tech Tribune’s website. Kate told the story of how VIA got its start, challenges along the way, and gave advice for aspiring entrepreneurs.

For the full article from this year’s list, visit the Tech Tribune website.

VIA Selected for Panel, Virtual Booth, and Pitch During AFWERX Reimagining Energy Showcase

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Last week, VIA had the honor of participating in the AFWERX Reimagining Energy Showcase. The showcase was attended by thousands of participants from government agencies and companies bringing cutting-edge technologies and solutions to the energy industry.

CEO Colin Gounden was invited to speak on the Energy Data Panel during the event along with representatives from companies participating in the AFWERX Challenge: Data Availability and Improved Planning and Decision Making. The panel touched on topics like how to make unstructured and disparate data sources available while addressing security concerns and how AI can play a role in decision making for the DoD.

In addition to Colin’s panel, VIA hosted a virtual booth during the showcase. The page is open to the public and can be visited here.

As mentioned in a previous press release, VIA is one of 179 companies chosen (out of over 1,000 submissions) to compete in the AFWERX Challenge. VIA’s solution to the Data Availability and Improved Planning and Decision Making Challenge is to use TAC™ to make energy data available for AI and machine learning analysis 100x faster.  

For more information on VIA’s solution to this challenge, watch our 5-minute pitch video.

VIA’s CEO Colin Gounden Speaking on Panel at AFWERX Reimagining Energy Showcase

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VIA’s CEO Colin Gounden has been selected to speak on the Energy Data Panel during the AFWERX Reimagining Energy Virtual Showcase. Colin’s panel will take place on February 9th at 2:28pm ET. To register for the event and attend his panel, visit: https://reimaginingenergy.afwerx.com/

VIA Selected by AFWERX to Pitch Solution to Reimagining Energy Challenge and Showcase at Virtual Event

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VIA is proud to have been selected to pitch to a group of government evaluators for the Reimagining Energy Challenge presented by AFWERX. Our solution aims to “help the DoD better leverage data, analytics, and reporting to improve energy strategies.” In addition to our pitch, we will be participating in the virtual showcase on February 9, 2021. To learn more and register for the event, please visit their website: https://reimaginingenergy.afwerx.com/