Gaist has secured a £2.1 million investment from BGF – the UK’s most active growth capital investor. The deal follows BGF’s initial investment in 2018, taking the total invested to £4.8 million.
The highways technology company has developed a revolutionary and IP-rich proprietary system for collecting and analysing, high-definition imagery of highways networks across the world. Clients include local authorities, major utilities companies, private highways network operators, and blue-chip firms with a growing focus on the connected vehicle market. Gaist has recently signed an exclusive deal which gives the business access to live sensor data
from tens of thousands of production cars allowing Gaist to monitor the deterioration of roads across the UK in real time.
With ambitions to ramp up the development of new technology by growing its artificial intelligence capabilities and attracting highly skilled developers to its strengthened team of specialists, the additional investment will enable Gaist to grow capacity to help meet demand from the UK and overseas, while allowing the business to take a more longer-term, strategic view.
Steve Birdsall, founder and CEO of Gaist, said: “BGF has been a hugely supportive investment partner in our growth journey to date. “The funding will help to fuel the momentum that is building across the world and maintain our position at the forefront of the geospatial market. It allows the business to further explore parallel markets, such as utilities, fibre to home, 5G and EV, enabling us to identify where charging points should be, as well as tapping into the vast opportunities around connected vehicles and how data can be used and shared more effectively.”
Pinesh Mehta, investor at BGF [in the North West], added: “Gaist continues to innovate and expand its ground-breaking ‘roadscape’ services, while growing its local authority and blue-chip customer base through referrals and best practice. “With complementary expansion plans in both in the domestic and overseas markets, such as Australia, Japan, South America, Africa and the Middle East, we look forward to supporting the business through this next growth phase with follow-on investment.”
Gaist’s industry-leading capabilities have also attracted interest from aligned data and geospatial groups, with whom it is now collaborating in a series of partnerships combining and layering its datasets and insights with ‘best-in-class’ partners. In combination with the capacity boost enabled by this investment, it will be able to provide deeper and more
nuanced insights around surface materials, deterioration modelling and asset information to its customers and to help further cement the UK’s reputation at the forefront of the transport technology market.
