Aerospace Xelerated, a 3-month accelerator programme for early-stage startups, announced on Monday, January 16, a list of 11 startups working on Digital Services and Solutions that will join their fourth cohort to solve critical challenges for the aerospace sector.
Aerospace Xelerated reveals that it received over 150 applications globally from Australia, Canada, France, Japan, Netherlands, UAE, the UK, and the USA.
Aiir Innovations: What you need to know
Amsterdam-based Aiir Innovations, a provider of AI-based software solutions for aircraft engine inspection, has been selected as one of the 11 startups for the fourth cohort.
Founded in 2016 by Bart Vredebregt, Miriam Huijser, Cassandra Loor, Fritjof Büttner, Steve Nowee, and Jan van Gemert, Aiir Innovations make aircraft engine inspection faster, efficient, and safer.
Generally, aircraft engine assessment consists of a visual inspection, which requires high concentration during the entire inspection. In most cases, it is time-consuming and exhausting.
The Dutch company has developed a software that mechanics can use during borescope inspections to detect anomalies like cracks and dents.
This way, the software increases the inspection’s productivity, enabling the mechanic to focus on assessing the damage. The software will get an indicating function and is self-learning.
Fourth cohort startups
The other ten startups selected for the fourth cohort of Aerospace Xelerated include:
AEROSENS (Miami, USA): Aerosens focuses on technology, digitalisation, and automation for aviation.
AR Engineering (Sharjah, United Arab Emirates): AR Engineering is a software development company with the mission to change the way we interact and learn with digital content.
Basetwo (Mississauga, Canada): Basetwo provides a low code platform that helps engineers design, build and operationalise digital twins of their manufacturing processes.
Conductor Software (Brisbane, Australia): Conductor combines people and performance data, giving leaders the insights they need to improve innovation, talent retention, customer experience, and performance.
Dessia Technologies (Paris, France): Dessia Technologies develops a software framework to accelerate decision-making and complex trade-offs with Artificial Intelligence in the engineering phases of industrial projects.
KIT-AR (London, United Kingdom): With the KIT-AR platform, manufacturing companies digitally enhance their human workers to reduce the cost of poor quality by combining augmented reality with machine learning to provide step-wise context-rich instructions with automated quality control.
NABLA Mobility (Tokyo, Japan): Reducing fuel consumption and carbon by using ML/AI to enhance flight plans with comprehensive, multi-factor flight optimisations.
People Tech Revolution (Brisbane, Australia): People Tech Revolution co-designs and builds immersive, human-centred VR training experiences.
Quaisr (London, United Kingdom): Digital connectivity infrastructure that scales simulation-backed AI workflows to mission-critical operational deployments, helping engineers to solve pressing problems in the design, monitoring, optimisation, and control.
Zetamotion (Fleet, United Kingdom): Zetamotion makes Quality Control faster and easier to deploy, use and scale by offering QC as a Service.
The 11 startups joining the cohort will cover four key focuses of the programme:
- Flight & Passenger Journey Optimisation
- Supply Chain Intelligence
- Next Generation Workforce
- and Operational Efficiency
According to Aerospace Xelerated, 80 per cent are first-time founders, 50 per cent have a female founder, and 50 per cent are minority ethnic amongst the founding teams.
Also, 40 per cent of the companies are at their seed stage and all operate in a hybrid model, having remote and in-person activities.
Benefits
Startups accepted into the programme will have the option to receive a £100K investment from Boeing, as well as the opportunity to receive a £100K investment from Tawazun Council.
Through this programme, the startups will be introduced to a network of angel investors, venture capitalists, and key stakeholders in the aerospace industry.
The selected companies will also have access to strategists and technical experts for support in developing proof of concept opportunities and receive mentoring from a global network of experienced entrepreneurs, mentors, and investors.
The successful companies will also get more than £100K in programme perks from partners, including startup providers Oracle, Amazon, HubSpot, Digital Ocean, and many more.
Aerospace Xelerated: What you need to know
Launched in 2019, Aerospace Xelerated is a 3-month accelerator for early-stage startups aiming to advance the future of sustainable aerospace.
“The programme is open to startups globally and is a Seed to Series A-stage accelerator for technology startups looking to impact and scale in the aerospace industry,” says the accelerator.
Following three successful cohorts led by Boeing and supported by industry partners, this year’s programme will partner with Tawazun Council, the defence and security acquisitions authority of the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Other partners include the UK Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA), GKN Aerospace, and Etihad Airways.
Cohort 4 will run from January to April 2023 for 12 weeks, culminating in a Demo Day in April 2023.
Since its launch, startups involved in three previous cohorts have raised over £200M in additional funding and created over 150 jobs across the UK and globally.
