Covid-19 delta outbreak: Auckland CO2 detection startup Tether raises millions for Covid push

Tether founder and CEO Brandon van Blerk said his company kicked off when it won a bid for a $ 7 million remote surveillance contract in Kāinga Ora (Housing NZ). Photo / included

After an earlier setback, Auckland startup Tether is on the rise, having just raised $ 1.75 million on a valuation of $ 10 million – and a pandemic-related product launch slated for later this month.

With a new one
Smartphone app with for lay-friendly ads, the company has adapted its US $ 303 EnviroQ – a device the size of a smoke detector that can read carbon dioxide levels – as a “Covid Care” product to measure the security of an enclosed space.

Tether’s Covid Care sensor is mounted on a classroom wall. The Auckland start-up is involved in a CO2 monitoring study by the Ministry of Education. Photo / included

CO2 is created when people exhale, and measuring the amount of CO2 in the air is one way of assessing whether a room is ventilated well enough to minimize the risk of Covid transmission.

With Auckland on the verge of serious reopening, founder and CEO Brandon van Blerk is targeting the product at retail stores, schools, gyms and geriatric care providers and has more than 2000 units in production.

Van Blerk says that one of his company’s sensors can detect that a ventilation system needs to be installed in an enclosed space – but it could also be used to signal a simple action, such as it is time for a teacher to opening the windows of a classroom to let in fresh air.

Van Blerk started his startup with money that he earned with cryptocurrency.

The seed funding announced this week comes from new investors including the Crown-backed Aspire Fund from NZ Growth Capital Partners, the Impact Investment Fund (with Ākina chairman Ben Kepes on its investment committee), and Greenside Energy Solutions (an isolation, Heat pump and ventilation). Company that is also a Tether customer) helps finance the new product push.

Roller coaster ride

The raise comes after a 24 month roller coaster ride for the 4 year old company.

At the end of 2019, Tether appeared to be in Klee. It won a highly competitive tender against 58 other companies, including Internet of Things (IoT) advocates Spark and Vodafone, for remote monitoring of CO2, humidity and a host of other elements in a number of Kāinga Ora ( Housing NZ) properties.

Van Blerk was thrilled that his startup – which he says consists of “11 employees, all engineers, no salespeople” – had stood up to much greater competition to win the $ 7 million contract.

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But then there was a privacy fear over the remote monitoring pilot who was supposed to collect and measure data for a healthier home, as van Blerk puts it, “if it’s raining in a house because of condensation on the windows.”

Van Blerk says opponents have overestimated and wrongly characterized the extent of surveillance.

“All of a sudden, the media started talking about how to use CO2 to understand occupancy and kick people out of their homes and take advantage of them – and they’ll know you’re doing Zumba in your lounge,” he says .

The controversy subsided after Kāinga Ora clarified the parameters of the remote monitoring project.

But it was going to get worse. The first installations should begin in early 2020 when the first lockdown occurred.

After several delays, the pilot project is now set to begin this year – but has now been reduced to a contract worth 1.5 million US dollars.

Tether’s “Covid Care” solution includes a sensor (US $ 303) plus an app that is free for one year and then costs US $ 4.32 per month. Picture / included

Tether is still the sole supplier, but downsizing the project was still “like a blow to the heart,” says van Blerk – who notes that the downsizing came after taking responsibility for the program from a Kāinga Ora department to a other has been relocated.

Then there was more pandemic grief in the form of supply chain disruptions and shipping delays.

Tether manufactures locally but imports some components including microprocessors, resistors, and capacitors.

“We had some components that we had to replace because I had 52 weeks lead time for components.

“You can’t run a company if you don’t know whether you can get hardware in 12 months.

“So this is where we conjured up our PCBs [printed circuit boards]. We have three different prints so you can choose which component is available. “

The approach has paid off. Tether is manufacturing 2,000 EnviroQ units this month with an additional 3,000 expected to be manufactured in the new year, followed by a batch of 5,000 in May.

Photo / included

The production surge is underpinned by the new capital, but van Blerk admits that this is still a leap of faith. “We’re putting our eggs on the line,” says the South African expat.

Risk is minimized by a growing list of customers and partners including the Building Research Association of NZ (Branz), Motu and the aforementioned Kāinga Ora, and the Ministry of Education, which is testing EnviroQ in a number of schools.

Although there are many air quality detectors on the market, van Blerk can point out that his company defeated 53 of its competitors in the Kāinga Ora contract. And he says the new app for the EnviroQ makes a difference in that it eschews the jargon for air quality indicators that use everyday language.

The EnviroQ used for the pandemic push is the same model that won the Kāinga Ora contract. In addition to CO2, it monitors temperature, ambient light, humidity, air pressure and ambient noise.

Each of the $ 303 devices runs on six AAA batteries for about two years (there is also an AC power option) and does not connect to the Internet via cellular or Wi-Fi, but via LPWAN (Low Powered Wide Area Network).

A 12-month subscription to the Tether app is included in a new EnviroQ. After that, it costs $ 4.32 per unit per month.

It is now one of three gadgets in the Tether range that also includes a dedicated humidity and temperature monitor and the HotDrop to measure energy consumption.

Does the science work?

In short, yes, with some qualifications.

The relationship between CO2 saturation and Covid transmission is more the area of ​​peer-reviewed academic research than the Facebook scratch. Writing for the academic portal The Conversation, chemistry professor at York University and indoor air quality expert Professor Nicola Carslaw recently noted that research shows that high levels of CO2 are not only a risk factor for the transmission of Covid, but concentration as well and undermine people’s thinking ability.

Carslaw noted that there are variables like the fact that taller people and more active people expel more air than shorter or inactive people. And she found that cooking can cause higher levels of CO2. This means that in some enclosed spaces – think a café or an open kitchen and living room – CO2 saturation is not necessarily a good indicator of Covid risk.

But the basic premise is simple.

“People emit carbon dioxide when they breathe, and all other things being equal, the more people there are in a room, the higher the carbon dioxide concentration. If windows and doors are closed in an inhabited room, the carbon dioxide concentration increases steadily. And if someone in the room has Covid, there will also be concentration of coronavirus particles (or ‘virions’), ”Carslaw wrote.

She pointed out that the Belgian authorities recently made it mandatory for people who run hotels, restaurants, bars, banquet halls and fitness centers to monitor carbon dioxide levels in their venues as a protection against Covid.

The professor said the CO2 level should not exceed 1000 parts per million (ppm).

Van Blerk says his company’s experience is that New Zealand buildings are often poorly ventilated and routinely exceed this level.

He adds, “Research shows that for every additional 400ppm of CO2 added to a room via fresh air, which averages around 410ppm, there is a risk of carryability compounds. For example, if the CO2 level in your building goes from 410 ppm to 1610 ppm, the risk of transmission of Covid would be tripled. “