Earthmover Aims to Be the Snowflake for Weather and Location Data
▼ Summary
– Earthmover pivoted from climate data to focus on weather data because it changes frequently and creates more urgent use cases.
– The company’s core product is a data structure built to handle large, complex datasets like rasters or tensors.
– Earthmover secured a $7.2 million seed round and has gained over 10 paying customers following its strategic pivot.
– The startup is built on open-source software to mitigate customer risk and ensure data accessibility even if the company fails.
– Earthmover’s platform helps customers like insurance and energy companies assess risks and forecast supply and demand.
The sheer volume of information produced by observing our planet from space is staggering, yet for Earthmover, it became clear that simply having access to vast Earth observation data wasn’t sufficient for success. Founders Ryan Abernathey and Joe Hamman recognized their climate tech venture needed a strategic shift. This pivot didn’t mean abandoning their core mission but rather refining their focus to address how climate impacts daily operations, specifically, by concentrating on weather data and its immediate applications.
Abernathey, who serves as Earthmover’s CEO, explained that the most compelling use cases for their platform involve information that updates frequently. This urgency naturally directs attention toward weather patterns, fire incidents, and new observational data streams. While long-term climate projections remain important, they are relatively static, with major updates occurring only every few years. In contrast, weather data changes constantly, creating a continuous need for analysis and insight.
At its heart, Earthmover’s product is a sophisticated data structure engineered to manage large, complex datasets. Whether referred to as a raster in geospatial contexts, a tensor in artificial intelligence, or simply an array in older programming languages like Fortran, the underlying concept is the same. The company has developed a suite of tools that operate on this foundation, enabling clients to extract meaningful insights from their information. This refined strategy has already proven effective, attracting more than ten paying customers and securing a $7.2 million seed funding round. The investment was spearheaded by Lowercarbon Capital, with additional support from Costanoa Ventures and Preston-Werner Ventures. These resources are being channeled into developing new analytical tools that enhance the company’s data storage platform.
The entire Earthmover system is constructed using open-source software, including Xarray, Pangeo, and Icechunk. It is compatible with major cloud services like Google Cloud, AWS, and Microsoft Azure, as well as on-premise server infrastructure. Both Abernathey and CTO Joe Hamman bring substantial open-source expertise to the table, having contributed to projects like Pangeo and Xarray. A significant motivation for leveraging these tools is their proven capability to handle the enormous scale of Earth observation data, which can easily require terabytes or even petabytes of storage. Typical clients manage anywhere from tens to hundreds of terabytes.
Choosing an open-source foundation also addresses a critical business concern for customers. Relying on a startup for essential services can be a risk for large, multinational corporations. By building upon open-source technologies, Earthmover provides a layer of security. Clients retain control over their data within their own storage systems, mitigating risk should the company’s direction change or if it were to cease operations.
Current Earthmover clients include innovative firms like insurance startup Kettle, which utilizes the platform to evaluate and model wildfire risk. Another notable customer is RWE, a major German energy company. Renewable energy providers, whose output is directly influenced by weather conditions, use Earthmover’s forecasting tools to predict supply and demand fluctuations with greater accuracy.
The overarching ambition for Earthmover is to democratize access to complex weather and location-based information. As Hamman points out, end-users such as financial trading desks need to see the latest forecast visualizations on a dashboard immediately. They require straightforward, accessible insights without the need to execute Python scripts or manage complex data processing workflows themselves. The goal is to make powerful geospatial intelligence as effortless to use as checking a daily weather report.
(Source: TechCrunch)
