Sector: Software
Invested: July 2024
Founder:
Infinity Studio is automating geotechnical engineering for faster delivery with improved accuracy.
The Problem – Technically Lagging in Geotechnical
Geotechnical engineering (GTE) is the architectural design of the earth. It looks at the properties of the ground where we build skyscrapers, highways and every other structure to ensure designs are safe, reliable and resilient. This engineering sphere is the bedrock of all construction design decisions and relies on managing vast amounts of siloed and specialised data to construct an understanding of subsurface conditions. Its criticality to public and private infrastructure is immense and impacts the vast global civil infrastructure spend which is growing past US$9 trillion annually. Getting GTE wrong can cost money, time and lives.
Even with GTE’s importance, the digital landscape for processing and manipulating this data remains dominated by slow-moving legacy incumbents, point-solutions or Excel spreadsheets. One key aspect which surprises everyone from outside the discipline is the lack of modernity in cloud architectures, data handling and automation, which are all missing from present state GTE. It is confronting to see such a critical activity existing so far in the digital past. It is also the reason why Infinity Studio are stepping in to create a new digital order.
Infinity Studio Enters
Infinity Studio is founded by industry veterans Sjoerd van Ballegooy and Rekha Kharbanda, who together formed the vision for the phase change that needed to occur within the GTE industry. Sjoerd is a key leader in the civil engineering industry and is recognised internationally for his work in geotechnical engineering. Rekha’s digital credentials are backed by her being named the CIO.com top-ranking Chief Information Officer in New Zealand for 2022, and a nominee in Startup Daily’s “Best New Founder” award for 2024.
The duo spun Infinity Studio out of prominent engineering consultant Tonkin + Taylor, Rekha (former T+T CIO) and Sjoerd (former T+T Head Geotechnical Engineer) in 2023 and have since built up an incredible team which earlier this year released their MVP of the Apeiron platform. Their deep understanding of digital strategy in the space is evident in our conversations and a major reason why we have backed them via our Aspire fund at this early stage.
The platform, Apeiron, is the new digital way in GTE; a cloud services platform containing an end-to-end suite of analysis modules which covers large portions of an engineer’s total workflow, from data aggregation and interpretation all the way through to report output. Through embracing cloud, advanced data structuring, and automation Infinity Studio has been able to create a new way of working which looks to eliminate the information silos, data handling errors, and lack of data transferability throughout different parts of the engineer’s workflow. Beyond simply creating massive efficiency gains in the here and now, it is evident that Apeiron can be built out to have a wider impact across multiple business groups through enabling activities including:
- Interoperability with other business groups – Engineers in other teams can integrate their data into GTE workflows, allowing automatic updates across downstream modules and streamlining collaborative design iterations,
- Enhanced project data observability – Project / Programme managers are more effectively able to view and track progress on design work, leading to greater control over project timeframes,
- Monetisation of proprietary data – tapping into the wealth of data in engineering firm databases to generate additional revenue streams.
At Aspire, we believe this technology approach is an ideal match to the market that Infinity Studio is entering and signals a step change away from the status quo enforced by incumbents.
The Solution
In little less than a year, the Infinity Studio team have built and deployed an intuitive, feature-rich platform which is already giving value to multiple international-scale engineering companies. Like us, these organisations were quick to realise the value of the Apeiron platform where iterations of complex geotechnical data hosted on behemoth Excel spreadsheets were condensed into slick and sophisticated summaries and workflows over one 30-minute call, a far cry from the 6-week timeline one user spoke of.
At the heart of our investment thesis is the exceptional Infinity Studio team, comprised of many geotechnical engineers doubling as product owners. The design of Apeiron was frequently mentioned in customer reference calls, noting that it felt like it was built by people that really understood GTE’s specific challenges. Aspire’s investment into Infinity Studio is supportive of Rekha and Sjoerd’s vision to revolutionise geotechnical software and data management for geotechnical engineers, towards streamlined workflows enabling vastly accelerated delivery timelines.
The Future
The Infinity Studio team have ambitious goals to reduce 50% of all geotechnical engineering workflows with their Apeiron platform. While it is still early days, the team have wasted no time forging partnerships with engineering firms that will put the Apeiron platform in the hands of engineers working across some of the largest infrastructure projects in Australasia.
With a product roadmap that speaks to the company’s deep understanding of their customer, Infinity Studio are geared up to be the go-to platform for geotechnical engineering analysis and design.
We are co-investing alongside angel investor Mike Harrod, who has joined the Infinity Studio board as Chair, and Gavin Baird who has joined as CTO. We are excited to see this talented team expand the platform and drive the positive change they want to see in this fundamentally important industry.
