Biped Smart Harness gets Honda attention

In an exciting new partnership. biped is joining forces with Honda Research Institute to take its prediction abilities next level. As cofounder and CEO Mael Fabien explains to Startupticker.ch, biped caught the attention of Honda on LinkedIn as it showcased some of its recent software progress. The car company research institute realized that some of the building blocks of self-driving systems and advanced driver assistance systems in vehicles could be used to guide blind people too. Led by the goal to apply its technology outside of more traditional use-cases, the Research Institute got its perfect collaboration.

Biped is currently integrating a risk model from Honda. This will be used to estimate risks of collision between a pedestrian and its surroundings (cars, electric scooters…) in real-time. Honda will be offering additional PR support to the startup, but no specific product distribution. Speaking of the cost for the startup, both parties agreed on terms where biped pays a small fee compared with the development of such a model, as a commitment of Honda to the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN.

Aiming high

The startup based at the Biopôle Lausanne hopes to improve significantly its product with this collaboration. A world’s first project really bridging the gap between pedestrian mobility and self-driving cars, says the CEO enthusiastically. Speaking of the future Mael Fabien adds: “We also hope to create synergies and faster innovation cycles in the assistive technology space by integrating even more software later. We are shipping our first batches these days, and improving the device continuously based on user feedback. We’re closing a seed round early 2023 with an exciting pool of business angels, but we’ll share the news soon”

(ES)