Discount Tire is participating in the latest round of investment in San Mateo, Calif.-based intelligent tire management platform provider Revvo Technologies.
Revvo recently announced it has raised an additional $6 million in series seed funding, led by Vulcan Capital and involving Discount Tire and Norwest Venture Partners.
"The mobility and transportation sectors continue to advance with more connected and autonomous vehicle technologies to improve safety and efficiency," say Revvo officials.
"However, the tire has lagged in being incorporated into the connected ecosystem, despite being one of the most critical components of a vehicle's performance, safety and reliability."
Revvo says its platform, which provides "visibility and predictive analytics on each vehicle's tire life and alerting in real-time of any tire damage," has captured more than 25 million miles of tire data.
It uses proprietary sensors that are embedded inside tires and generate "a real-time feed of a tire's condition and performance. The sensors capture thousands of data points per second from the interior of the tire" and information is sent "to the cloud via an app on the driver's phone. Artificial intelligence and machine learning models are applied to the aggregated data set to better predict tire tread wear."
The company's growing customer base includes fleets of autonomous vehicles, last-mile delivery vans, waste haul trucks and Class 8 trucks and trailers.
"Leveraging Revvo's connected vehicle and sensor-enabled artificial intelligence software platform, these fleets have experienced increases in tire life upwards of 30%, a reduction of 70% in critical tire issues and a reduction of 50% in labor time associated with tires."
"We are propelling the tire into the connected vehicle ecosystem, using our experience in AI and machine learning," says Sunjay Dodani, Revvo's CEO. "Today we focus on fleets and service providers of tires, helping them identify and act on tires that need attention in order to ensure vehicles are safe and do not suffer any downtime."
"We are really excited about our partnership with Revvo and how complimentary it is to our strategy of providing an inviting, easy and safe tire and wheel experience," says Chris Adams, vice president of fleet and partnerships, Discount Tire.
"We have had very positive feedback from our fleet customers that are currently using Revvo, helping them reduce down time while enhancing vehicle and driver safety. We look forward to continuing to partner with Revvo and expand into new markets."
Revvo says it will use the latest found of investment "to expand its go-to market and partnership teams."
