Santa Cruz Accelerates member, Andre Cheung, CEO and founder of Robotics Cats, has been selected as a semi-finalist for the 2022 Global Problem Solver Challenge hosted by Cisco. The 6th Annual Global Problem Solver Challenge aims to “recognize new business ideas that leverage technology for social impact from early-stage entrepreneurs around the world.”

Our world is becoming increasingly more reliant on digital technologies, data, and devices and the Challenge aims to accelerate early-stage innovative technology companies and their solutions for our planet’s most pressing social and environmental problems.

Robotics Cats aims to tackle a significant issue that has impacted several countries and wildlife across the globe, especially as of late: wildfires. Robotics Cats has developed a wildfire detection system that uses AI and IoT to help governments, businesses, and anyone concerned about wildfires monitor and detect wildfires so that they are able to quickly respond and prevent them from spreading further.

The competition will award a $250,000USD prize to the first place finalist and a variety of prizes for other remaining finalists (first and second runner up, people’s choice, employee’s choice, etc.) which totals to $1,000,000 awarded.

Almost 1200 teams entered the competition, however, only 94 teams were selected to move forward to the semi-finals. The finalists of the Challenge will be announced on July 5th, 2022.

Best of luck to Robotics Cats!

About Robotics Cats

Robotics Cats builds AI-powered tools for governments, businesses, and people to mitigate wildfire by early detection. The earlier we detect a wildfire, the better actions we can take to control it. Wildfire is a global problem. Government alone is not enough to combat wildfire. We need businesses and people to participate in reducing wildfire risks and damages more effectively. We developed LookOut to help businesses and people to protect their assets and communities. It is flexible. It is quick-to-deploy. It is easy-to-use.

Our LookOut wildfire detection Software-as-a-Service works with existing video cameras. New hardware is not required, and therefore deployment is much faster! You can turn on LookOut on your video camera in 5 minutes. LookOut uses Machine Learning object detection to detect wildfire from the images captured by the camera. It detects wildfire automatically and accurately 24/7. If LookOut finds anything suspicious, it will send alerts to users via mobile app. It is easy to use. LookOut is deployed in 5 markets now. LookOut will serve 12 countries by the end of 2021. We will bring LookOut to Santa Cruz very soon!