Jaipur Robotics co-founders on how they are revolutionizing waste management

Waste-to-energy power plants burn non-recyclable garbage to generate electricity. Every year, oversized or dangerous items like concrete or gas tanks cause obstructions, explosions, and unplanned shutdowns that cost plants up to €4 million in annual losses.

Jaipur Robotics co-founders Nikhil Prakash and Ermes Zamboni have developed a technology that utilizes intelligence-based recognition to help plants avoid these shutdowns and optimize energy output. 

Prakash and Zamboni met at prestigious research university ETH Zurich where they worked together on a project building intelligent solutions for waste sorting in commercial facilities. 

Each had already gained extensive experience including key roles in successful startups and developing computer vision algorithms for satellites, it’s easy to see why the co-founders are the perfect team to tackle this project. 

We sat down with them to learn more about how this technology stands to completely change the waste management sector and why it’s so crucial in the age of an energy crisis. 

Can you explain what you’re building at Jaipur Robotics?

Ermes: Jaipur Robotics is a B2B SaaS company that develops deep learning software solutions for waste-to-energy power plants. In general, these plants all struggle with the same three problems. 

1. Waste is usually handled using a crane which is manually operated from a control room. The crane operator assigned to this task has to visually identify dangerous or obstructive materials. 
2. Because waste is made up of so many different materials, the amount of energy it produces can vary a lot. It’s hard to make sure waste in a bunker is well-mixed so that energy output is consistent. 
3. Plants experience labor shortages of trained operators because it’s harder and harder to find qualified, experienced personnel. 

We install a suite of customized sensors that collects data and helps plants avoid these issues. 

Crane operators get a dashboard that alerts them to oversized or dangerous waste items so they can be removed before they cause problems. 

We also give the operator a color map of different areas of the bunker so they can optimize the waste mix, keep the energy conversion rates consistent and efficient, and reduce pollutants released at the stack.

How did you come up with this idea? 

Ermes: I was pitching the company at a large event in Italy but our focus back then was slightly different. The managing director of one of the largest waste-to-energy plants in Europe happened to be in the audience. 

He approached us and said he was interested in what we were doing and that he thought it could be applied in a different use case.

So he invited us to the waste facility, explained the challenges, and then we went back to Switzerland and built a case. With this, we were able to secure our first contract with one of the largest waste management companies in Switzerland.

Is this a new departure in waste management? 

Nikhil: We are building a super-specialized technology for our first customer and it's pretty new. We are in the process of calibrating it for them so that it performs at its best. We want to reach out to more clients across Europe and build on top of what we have already done — more features and more use cases.

Ermes: For us, waste-to-energy is a way to enter a huge market. The waste industry is worth $1.3 trillion US. We cannot tackle everything so we need to be laser-focused and start with something that is niche but has the possibility to expand. We aim to become the number one operating system for the waste industry. That's the long-term goal. 

I can imagine the scope is huge.

Ermes: Absolutely. We are living in an energy crisis. It would be insane to just let landfill sit somewhere occupying space and generating pollutants when you could extract value from it. And that's exactly where waste-to-energy comes into play and why the industry is growing at 7.1% CAGR (compound annual growth rate). 

Do you have any key milestones you’d like to achieve during Techstars? 

Ermes: Definitely. So we are currently fundraising for our pre-seed round with $1 million as the target. We have a VC as our lead investor along with business angels and high net-worth individuals who are willing to invest in us. The round is currently oversubscribed.

We’ll use this funding to finance our first hires in the product development space. We're looking for a senior software developer, a front-end engineer, and someone who can handle communications and marketing.

Our business goals are to close contracts by the end of the year. We’re talking with major entities in Italy and large companies within Europe. 

Nikhil: We have product goals as well. The goal is to get some success stories that will help us sell to future customers. We already have a product roadmap that we are building for our customers. That way we could provide end-to-end solutions for waste-to-energy plants powered by intelligent algorithms.

How are potential customers responding to your idea? 

Ermes: It’s very, very clear customers are eager for our technology. We are experiencing much shorter sales cycles than we initially had in mind because the potential savings we could deliver to these plants is in the order of millions. 

When you look to the future of the waste industry, how do you see it evolving? 

Ermes: I would say right now the waste industry has a huge data problem.

Most of the waste that is generated, transported, and repurposed somehow, like energy recovery or material recovery, is not really properly tracked. And in order to tackle the waste problem, first you need to be able to measure it. It’s by measuring, by having this data, that you can actually improve it.

Our system tackles exactly this. When you can look at the full picture, you have the data you need to make a useful decision. We all have to work on producing less waste, and then if you really have to, find a way to handle that waste in a more environmentally-sustainable way.

Can I ask where the company name comes from? 

Ermes: We really love the city of Jaipur. It’s the Florence of India; culture, heritage, colors. It’s a place that says a lot about humans and society. Robotics brings in the technological side.

Nikhil: The name Jaipur Robotics expresses our desire to build technology that improves society and humanity. Waste is one of humanity's greatest challenges. It might not be as sexy as other industries, but it’s a huge growing problem and we feel as founders, as human beings, that this is where we should put our efforts.

Beautiful. Best of luck, team!