The Rising Cost of Workplace Incidents and a New Solution

According to the Economic Policy Institute, workplace injuries and illnesses impose a significant financial burden on the United States, exceeding $250 billion annually. Intenseye, a startup supported by ERA, is leveraging a machine learning platform to address this issue and substantially reduce these costs through economic and efficient means.

Seed Funding and Investors

Intenseye has successfully secured $4 million in a seed funding round. This investment was jointly led by Point Nine and Air Street Capital. Additional participation came from angel investors associated with companies including Twitter, Cortex, Fastly, and Even Responsible Finance.

How Intenseye Enhances Workplace Safety

The Intenseye system integrates seamlessly with pre-existing, network-connected cameras already installed within work facilities. Utilizing computer vision technology, it actively monitors the health and safety of employees during their work activities.

This allows for the real-time detection of safety and health violations, ranging from failure to wear required personal protective equipment like hard hats, to breaches of social distancing guidelines, and other potential hazards.

Real-Time Monitoring and Customizable Rules

The platform’s dashboard is designed to incorporate both federal and local workplace safety regulations. It also allows for the implementation of an organization’s specific safety protocols, enabling real-time worker safety monitoring.

Currently, Intenseye can identify up to 30 distinct unsafe behaviors commonly observed in workplace environments. Managers have the ability to personalize these rules further through an intuitive drag-and-drop interface.

Alerts and Compliance Scoring

Upon detection of a violation, employee health and safety professionals are immediately notified via text message or email, facilitating prompt issue resolution.

Intenseye also aggregates workplace safety compliance data to generate a comprehensive compliance score. This score helps pinpoint areas requiring improvement within a facility.

Pricing Model

The company employs a pricing structure that includes an initial deployment fee. Following this, an annual fee is applied, calculated based on the number of cameras utilized as Intenseye monitoring points.

Data Privacy and Technical Challenges

Co-founder Sercan Esen highlighted a key technical challenge: ensuring workplace safety monitoring via computer vision while simultaneously protecting employee privacy. Intenseye is designed to send EHS (employee health and safety) violation alerts without analyzing or identifying faces.

Furthermore, all video data is destroyed immediately after processing and is never stored by Intenseye.

Team Composition and Diversity

The Intenseye team currently comprises 20 individuals.

“Our team consists of 20% female and 80% male representation, spanning four different nationalities,” Esen stated. “We value diverse educational backgrounds, with team members holding advanced degrees in computer science alongside those with high school diplomas.”

The company recognizes the critical importance of diversity and inclusion, particularly given its focus on developing computer vision software.

Remote Work and Virtual Collaboration

In response to the pandemic, Intenseye has transitioned to a remote work model. To foster a more engaging and immersive work experience than traditional video conferencing, the company is utilizing virtual reality (VR) to create a virtual office environment.

Future Plans and Deployment

Intenseye is presently deployed in 30 cities. The newly acquired funding will be allocated towards expanding the team, specifically within the sales and marketing departments, and implementing effective go-to-market strategies.

Correction

An earlier iteration of this article incorrectly stated that angel investors from Even Financial participated in the funding round. This has been corrected for accuracy.