Smart hardhat startup raises $30m

Construction startup Buildots has raised $30m in Series B funding as it expands its smart hardhat technology to a dozen countries.

Founded in 2018, Buildots was created to give project managers full control of everything going on at a construction site through a hardhat-mounted 360º camera.

By using AI algorithms, the camera detects any gaps between the original design, scheduling and the reality on the construction site.

Buildots calls this a “mobile control room” for project managers, allowing them to make decisions that speed up construction and reduce costs.

Led by Lightspeed Ventures – with participation from previous investors TLV Partners, Future Energy Ventures and Tidhar Construction Group – the funding round will give Buildots the capital to double the size of its global team with a focus on its sales and R&D departments.

The company said its tech is used by companies in the US, UK, Germany, Switzerland, Scandinavia, Hong Kong and elsewhere, with existing clients including the Build Group in California and Washington state and MBN in Germany.

Despite accounting for 13% of the world’s GDP, construction productivity has stagnated, growing just 1% in the past two decades according to the European Commission.

Ray Danon, co-founder and CEO of Buildots, said this was part of the driving force behind the startup, adding that the problems the sector faces are universal.

He said: “When it comes to digital transformation, construction has been a sleeping giant and Covid-19 served as an accelerator for the industry.

“We are now working with construction companies in over a dozen countries and what we’re seeing is that the challenges Buildot is addressing are ubiquitous around the world.

“A global expansion at the rate we’ve experienced would have ordinarily been impossible in an industry like construction that has its roots in handshake deals and in-person relationships without the new Covid reality of remote meetings and even deal signings.”

Tal Morgenstern, partner at Lightspeed, said: “Construction is a massive market with real GDP impact but it is still underserved by technology. We believe Buildots is the company that will change that reality.

“They have created a truly unique technology, productized in a way that generates measurable ROI while still being simple enough for end-users to navigate seamlessly. The rapid adoption Buildots has seen to date is driven exclusively by word of mouth. Following that success, this financing round will support an aggressive growth plan going forward.”