With fresh capital, DeTect to sharpen focus on industrial AI and IoT

DeTect Technologies, an industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) startup, said on Wednesday it has raised $12 million (Rs 89.1 crore) in a round led by venture capital firm Accel.  

The Chennai-based company said it would utilise the funds to further expand and strengthen its sales and operations teams across India and international markets. 

It also intends to use part of the capital for research and development and product innovation to strengthen its presence in industrial artificial intelligence and IoT. 

The funding round saw participation from existing investor Elevation Capital, Bharat Innovation Fund, BlueHill Capital, and Axilor Ventures. Stride Ventures participated in the round as a venture debt partner, Detect Technologies said.  

“The pandemic accelerated the adoption of automation, leading to large-scale disruption in industrial technology,” said Daniel Raj David, CEO and co-founder of Detect Technologies. 

“Our team seized this opportunity to spearhead industrial transformation and has achieved operational excellence with prominent industrial players,” David added. 

Accel has been the first institutional investor to back many Indian startups such as Acko, Blackbuck, Bounce, BookMyShow, Vedantu, Clevertap, Curefit, Mindtickle, Moglix, Ninjacart, Portea, StanzaLiving and UrbanClap. 

“The industrial sector loses millions globally in revenue due to unplanned shutdowns, a result of lack of intelligent real-time data and insights to aid decision-making…At Accel, we believe that the Detect team is well equipped to solve this problem, and we are excited to partner with them,” Barath Shankar Subramanian, partner at Accel, said.  

In 2018, DeTect Technologies raised $3.3 million in a Series A round of funding led by multi-stage investment firm SAIF Partners.

DeTect Technologies was founded in 2013 by Indian Institute of Technology-Madras graduates Tarun Mishra, David, Harikrishnan AS, Karthik R and professor Krishnan Balasubramanian.  

The firm was incorporated in 2016. It currently operates in Chennai, Bengaluru, Jamnagar and the UK.