Building the next generation of advanced and affordable robotic solutions at the intersection of robotics and hazardous environments for firefighting, emergency response, public safety, oil & gas, and industrial.
With 500K+ annual structural fires causing $500B+ in economic loss, firefighters across the U.S. face life-threatening risks searching for victims, resulting in tens of thousands of injuries, fatalities, and immense healthcare costs exceeding $6B annually, despite 60% of these fires having no human presence. Beyond firefighting, industries like oil and gas encounter thousands of dangerous incidents yearly (300+ fires, 300+ explosions annually), while over 15,000 HazMat emergencies demand swift, advanced robotic intervention. Current robotic solutions are either too costly and impractical or unreliable under extreme conditions, leaving critical safety gaps across emergency and industrial sectors. Despite the clear and pressing need for robust, accessible technology across these hazardous domains, no truly rugged and affordable robotic solutions exist. FireBot is the world’s first high-temp resistant robot designed to augment firefighting operations, searching structure fires and hazardous environments for humans and hazards, protecting brave firefighters. FireBot is an incredibly rugged obstacle climbing unmanned ground vehicle with a modular, advanced sensor suite that provides life-saving mission-critical situational-awareness in the most hazardous conditions. FireBot’s award-winning tech revolutionizes firefighting, mitigating fatalities, $6B in injuries, toxic exposures, and illnesses. Designed as a rugged, rapid-response vehicle, FireBot features advanced capabilities such as obstacle and debris climbing, 3D mapping, AI-powered image analysis, and real-time toxic and explosive gas detection. In industrial applications, FireBot provides a CBRNE-resistant, HazMat-proof solution, offering critical data and mitigating risks in hazardous environments. There is a massive lack of cheap, rugged robots, and FireBot is poised to scale.
Eleven years ago, I was shocked by the tragic death of five Houston firefighters who perished in a hotel fire while searching for survivors. Learning about the dangers and lack ofa technology firefighters face, I was motivated to develop a robotic solution to help ensure they return home safely. Discovering this issue was systemic, I collaborated over 10 years with 60 fire departments and 4,000 firefighters, leading to FireBot and assembling a brilliant team. With 60 years of combined experience in robotics, materials science, and software development, our ambitious team of 7 brings expertise from NASA, JPL, SpaceX, Lockheed Martin, and the Department of Defense. Several members have built venture-backed businesses in climate-tech, deep-tech, and SaaS. Siddharth Thakur (CEO) is a serial founder (1x exit), published roboticist, and innovator leading commercial/GTM. Krishnan Ram (CTO), a serial founder (2x exits) and expert in dynamics and control systems, leads technology/engineering.
Our go-to-market strategy begins with private fire departments and emergency response teams, a high-potential, untapped market of over 2,500 departments in the U.S. (e.g., Chevron, Refinery Terminal Fire Company, Pratt & Whitney). This Initial Customer Profile (ICP) prioritizes safety and cost reduction, and our FireBot addresses critical pain points: OSHA compliance, risk mitigation, injury prevention, and reducing incident response time (20x faster searches). These outcomes enable cost savings, enhanced safety, and force-multiplication of existing teams. We’ve validated and de-risked FireBot through municipal partners, ensuring readiness for the private sector. With faster sales motions, larger budgets, and quicker contracts, private departments offer a streamlined entry point.
To capture this market, we:
- Leverage our municipal network for introductions to private fire departments.
- Partner with federal/local joint command teams (CST, urban search and rescue, C6ISR) to showcase FireBot at demos and training events.
- Attend specialized conferences (e.g., HotZone, Clean Gulf).
- Deploy targeted marketing, word-of-mouth referrals, and channel partnerships with private fire distributors (e.g., Williams Fire).
We’ve developed four iterations of FireBot over nearly a decade, collaborating with 7,000+ fire departments, police, military, and industrial partners. Field validation through 71 beta-testing partners has secured multiple patents and strong interest from 7,000+ firefighters. With letters of intent, MOUs, and testing agreements in place, we are converting marquee partners into purchase orders while preparing to graduate municipal beta-testers to customers. This strategy ensures scalability across our Serviceable Addressable Market.
We operate with a dual revenue model, offering either a $120000 one-time purchase or a $40,000 annual robot-as-a-subscription (RAAS) lease, both including FireBot, training, support, and a 3-year warranty. This allows us to penetrate large and small depts. as well as various verticals. We generate additional revenue through $15,000 annual maintenance contracts, IP licensing, and add-on sensors. Our target market encompasses over 30,000 fire departments and 200,000 hazardous operation facilities (i.e. O&G, mining, chemical, mfct.), primarily serving municipal and private manufacturers. We have demonstrated significant market validation by engaging with over 4,000 first responders and establishing partnerships with more than 50 departments, with an initial strategic focus on 2,500 private fire departments, emergency teams, and commercial mfct. facilities. We take a bottoms up revenue based approach for market sizing. Selling 2 robots per facility, with a 40/60 split of customers choosing direct sales or RAAS respectively, with a TCV of $225k for direct sales and $400k for RAAS. Our SOM (private fire/emergency ~ 2,500 facilities) = $1.1B, SAM (municipal fire + police serving metropolitan populations ~29,000 departments) = $15B, and TAM (industrial + all hazardous operational facilities ~376,000 facilities) = $221B.
We are raising $3M in Pre-Seed funding to accelerate our path to commercialization and first revenue. This investment will enable us to successfully execute on our 71+ pilots across the U.S., complete development of our Gen 1 FireBot platform, convert our existing letters of intent into binding contracts and purchase orders, and establish our manufacturing and supply chain infrastructure. We will expand our go-to-market strategy beyond municipal fire departments to capture opportunities in private fire services, industrial facilities, and emergency response sectors. With this funding, we will achieve first commercial sales and build momentum to reach $1M in revenue by the end of 2025. Our strategic focus on product development, manufacturing readiness, and market expansion positions us to capture significant market share in the rapidly growing emergency robotics sector. This funding will serve as a bridge to our planned Seed round, providing the runway needed to demonstrate commercial validation and market traction.
We have developed four versions of FireBot over nearly a decade, collaborating closely with over 7,000 fire departments, police, emergency response teams, defense/military, and industrial partners. We have signed letters of intent, memorandum of understandings, and testing agreements with our partners, aiming to convert into purchase orders with our marquee customers as we hit requirements. Our product has undergone rigorous testing around the country achieving NASA TRL 7, pursuing 8/9, securing multiple patents and receiving immense interest from 7,000+ firefighters. FireBot is currently beta-tested by 71 partners around the U.S. through extensive field validation showing how it could save lives and improve safety. The novelty of FireBot stems from its incredibly rugged and hazard resistant platform, which is a unique patented combination of thermal protection systems, advanced life and hazard detecting sensors, and a compact, low-cost, tracked, obstacle-climbing robotic ground vehicle. FireBot addresses the needs of first responders by providing a robust, CBRNE-resistant, HazMat-proof unmanned ground vehicle (UGV) that can mitigate risks and provide vital information in dangerous environments. FireBot is hazardous-proof, fire-proof, bullet-proof (Class IIIA), heat-proof (650C for 15 min, 200C for 60 min), dust-proof, water-proof - a rugged, multi-purpose, versatile robotic platform able to climb rubble, stairs, and debris, and able to carry 300+lbs and move over 12 ft/s loaded with advanced sensors such as thermal, optical, radar (for 3D mapping), HazMat sensors, and more. Working with thousands of firefighters, spending a decade in R&D, our team has developed over 89 novel innovations through 4 robot platform iterations.
$100k in grants & $350k in angel investment
