Pre-collision sensing startup looks to revolutionize vehicle safety
PreAct’s “first-of-its-kind” technology uses extremely high-speed sensors and processors to monitor a very close area around a vehicle, within which the system identifies, classifies, and reacts to threats in milliseconds. The goal is to prepare a vehicle and occupant for an imminent crash, prior to it occurring.
The initial funding, says the company, will allow it to invest in key staff, technology, and prototyping as they move towards a minimum viable product.
“Nearly 3,500 people die in automobile crashes each day,” says Paul Drysch, co-founder and CEO of PreAct. “It’s staggering to think that even in modern vehicles equipped with airbags and other safety systems, that well over a million people are killed every year, and many millions more suffer serious injury.”
“In the vast majority of crashes, the passenger compartment remains intact with little intrusion. In such cases, there is often no reason for occupants to suffer serious trauma or death – other than for a lack of current technology to protect them. This technology gap is what PreAct Technologies is aiming to close.”
PreAct’s technology, says the company, can determine a collision – with certainty – up to 250 milliseconds prior to it happening. As a result, the company says it envisions being able to take a number of steps to protect a vehicle’s occupants: In the quarter-second timeframe before a crash, it would be possible to cinch seat belts, deploy larger and slower inflating airbags, deploy external airbags, and much more.
Current safety systems don’t engage until after a collision has already begun to occur. As a result, current airbags must be deployed with explosive force, in order to be fully inflated in time to catch an occupant.
The funding round was led by Singapore-based Elev8.VC.
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