Netradyne takes $90 million at $1.35 billion valuation to expand smart dashcams for commercial fleets

Distracted driving is one of the leading causes of car accidents and a major reason why auto insurance premiums are expected to increase in 2025. For commercial fleets, this is a nightmare. But for California-based startup Netradyne, it’s a tailwind.

Netradyne provide fleet owners, including big names like Amazonwith AI-enabled dashcams that collect vehicle data and video to improve driver safety, reducing accidents by around 50%, for the company. The devices, which can be equipped with inward- and outward-facing cameras, also use edge computing to send drivers real-time notifications if they are distracted or driving dangerously, while rewarding drivers for a good behavior

TechCrunch’s latest report Netradyne $150 million Series C in 2021, and since then the company has expanded beyond North America and India and into Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. To fuel growth in Ireland and Japan in the coming months, Netradyne has just raised a $90 million Series D at a pre-money valuation of $1.35 billion, led by Point72 Private Investments with participation from Qualcomm Ventures and Pavilion Capital.

And with big expansion comes big data. Over the years, Netradyne has amassed more than 18 billion miles of data, which the company says has helped improve the product to a point of 99% alert accuracy and 25 million better compliance scores.

Apart from the global expansion, the fresh capital will improve the product and strengthen the investments in the market.

Today, fleets can access Netradyne’s Safety Manager Assistant, an AI-powered co-pilot that offers a natural language interface to the company portal and uses generative AI to have conversations about data and insights . Avneesh Agrawal, CEO and co-founder of Netradyne, told TechCrunch that the company will invest more in generative AI, adding additional use cases to its co-pilot and a “more agent-based approach.”

Agrawal also noted that Netradyne will use its vast data to develop fundamental driving models with a focus on corner case driving scenarios to enhance autonomous driving technology.

“We have rich vision data that analyzes every aspect of the road and driving behavior and reading different road signs. No one in the autonomous industry has this kind of data,” said Agrawal. “Our goal now is to train a guidance model using generative AI to identify these leading cases.”

He added that it is not Netradyne’s intention to develop its own AV technology, but rather to partner with others and offer the startup’s data and insights.

Netradyne’s customers span fleets operating in online retail, food and beverage, oil and gas, utilities, construction, and more. The startup provides two main products. The first is a quad-view dashcam that collects footage from the road, the driver, and two side window cameras all in one easy-to-install device. This captures the driver’s behavior, reduces blind spots and provides evidence in the event of an accident. The second is a dual-view camera, which faces the road and the driver.

Fleet owners who need more visibility can use the Hub-X add-on, which is an extension to the dashcam that supports up to four additional cameras to be placed wherever needed, such as facing the rear of a bus.

The startup also offers a driver monitoring solution that can be added to the quad camera to detect drowsy driving behaviors using a dedicated sensor with night detection and the ability to see through most goggles. sun, according to the company.

In response to concerns about driver privacy, Agrawal says Netradyne is GDPR compliant and never provides drivers’ personally identifiable information externally.

“Investing in Netradyne is about believing in safer roads and supporting professional drivers,” said Sri Chandrasekar, managing partner at Point72 Private Investments. “Since our initial investment in 2018, we have witnessed Netradyne’s impressive growth and believe its technology is well positioned not only to empower fleet managers, but also to foster a culture of safe driving.”

Agrawal said Netradyne has seen 65% growth in the past 12 months, and expects to be net profitable in the next year.

This article has been updated to reflect Netradyne’s new assessment.