Hearty congratulations to our IP Innovation Clinic client Skygauge Robotics which announced today that it has closed a seed round of $3.3 million CAD led by BDC Capital’s Industrial Innovation Venture Fund with participation from RiSC Capital and follow-on from existing investors SOSV (through the HAX accelerator) and Hello Ventures.
Our IP Innovation Clinic assisted Skygauge Robotics in filing their first patent in 2016. Skygauge Robotic obtained this patent in 2020 and it played an instrumental part of their ability to secure funding.
The Skygauge team, Nikita Iliushkin, Chief Executive Officer, Linar Ismagilov, Chief Designer and Inventor, Maksym Korol, Chief Technology Officer, York University students part of the BEST lab at the Lassonde School of Engineering, using patented thrust-vectoring design, created a drone to maneuver with a full 6 degrees-of-freedom. “Conventional drones struggle to interact with the world because they can’t direct the forces required for any kind of job. They can hover and fly well, but they can’t push, pull, or twist, making them unsuitable for physical work” says Ismagilov. Once the team successfully captures the inspection market, Skygauge has planned expansions into physical jobs like painting, spraying, pressure washing, drilling, paint removal, high-rise window washing, welding, and general construction.
The vision for the company is to create a ‘Workforce in the Sky’. We wish Skygauge every success as they begin to hire and are proud of what they have already accomplished as students, and securing funding in the midst of the pandemic.
This is an excellent example of the benefits of collaborating and supporting our partners, like the BEST Lab at the Lassonde School of Engineering, to set up successful commercial ventures to change the world for the better.
About Skygauge Robotics:
Skygauge has reinvented the drone to perform work not possible with drones today. Their patented design is intended for industrial work applications. Skygauge aims to reduce the time and cost of industrial work, as well as improve operator safety by keeping them from working at height. With an initial target market in Ultrasonic Testing of industrial structures, the company subsequently intends to branch out into a wide array of work like pressure washing, painting, coating, scrubbing, welding, and other maintenance. The ultimate vision of the company is to use this design to create the ‘Workforce in the Sky’.
For more information visit https://www.skygauge.co/
Written by Prof Giuseppina (Pina) D’Agostino, Founder & Director of IP Osgoode, the IP Intensive Program, and the Innovation Clinic, the Editor-in-Chief for the IPilogue and the Intellectual Property Journal, and an Associate Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School.