Title: Revolutionizing Power Grid Maintenance: The Rise of Gridware
In the heart of Australia, amidst the devastation of the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires that charred over a million hectares and left many without power or homes, Tim Barat found solace in his role as a linesman at a power company. But when he moved to the U.S. in 2013, his wife’s safety concerns about working with high voltages led him to reevaluate his career path.
"She didn’t want me working with high voltage anymore, for safety reasons," Barat told TechCrunch. So, he returned to school, eventually earning a master’s degree in electrical engineering at UC Berkeley. Yet, Barat couldn’t shake his fascination with power lines – specifically, listening to them.
"As humans, we can’t feel electricity. We can only sense it, or get shocked," said Barat. But traditional human observation and acoustic sensing methods are inefficient and time-consuming. Power utility workers often have to travel miles to locate the source of an outage, which could range from a simple fallen branch to a power pole damaged by severe weather.
Barat, along with Abdulrahman Bin Omar and Hall Chen, founded Gridware to provide a better solution. Gridware’s product is a purpose-built device that accurately detects power grid issues.
"We look at the grid like a giant guitar, not a circuit board. It’s a physical problem, so we need to monitor the physical attributes of the network, not just voltage and current," said Barat. Their sensors, installed on power poles just below the lines, detect mechanical disturbances (sound and vibrations) that are analyzed by Gridware’s AI and signal processing software to identify various grid threats.
Each device, about the size of an iPad, is solar-powered with a tilted base to maximize sun exposure. Since they don’t touch the power lines or require separate power sources, they can be quickly installed, ensuring minimal service disruption. When potential issues are identified, details and location are sent to the cloud via cellular or satellite connections (or to nearby devices if signal strength is weak).
Barat revealed that Gridware had positive cash flow in 2021 but felt it was still a good time to raise funds. The company recently raised a $26.4 million Series A round led by Sequoia, with investments from Convective Capital, Fifty Years, Lowercarbon Capital, and True Ventures. Currently, Gridware monitors over 1,000 miles of power lines for 18 companies using devices installed on 10,000 poles.
Before convincing others, Barat ensured his invention worked by building his own grid – complete with 55-foot tall towers and 200-foot spans. He spent years testing it by simulating various outage scenarios, including short-circuiting transformers, throwing trees onto power lines, and cutting cables with wrenches.
How did his wife feel about this extra-curricular activity? "I got in trouble," he admitted, but added with a laugh, "That’s all over now because we usually have three to four real-world events per day."
