Takeoff Partners invests in CollectiveCrunch, provider of machine learning-based forecasts for industries

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Takeoff Partners adds CollectiveCrunch (www.collectivecrunch.com) to its investment portfolio as the lead investor in the company’s seed investment round. CollectiveCrunch is an analytics company that utilizes machine learning to combine technical, climate and geo data for the benefit of industries such as forestry. The seed round amounts to EUR 250,000 of equity financing which is part of a larger funding round involving debt and public funding. Among the investors and advisors are experienced industry professionals, including Jukka Sonninen, former head of SAP Finland, and senior executives from the energy and forest sectors.

Markko Vaarnas, Managing Partner of Takeoff Partners, the lead investor in the financing round comments: “From an investor’s perspective CollectiveCrunch provides an interesting new angle where machine learning meets concrete use cases in forestry and later on in other industry verticals. The weather and climate are something that increasingly many businesses need to take into account, which drives the need for new types of services. What also convinced us is the positive experiences and feedback from the first projects with the CollectiveCrunch analytics platform.”

Team of experts ready to take the company to the next level

Rolf Schmitz, CEO of CollectiveCrunch, says: “We have built a data and analytics platform that models technical data in the climatic and geo context. With our platform that makes use of state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms, our ambition is to first bring digitalization to the forest industry, and to expand to also serve the logistics business further down the road. The market response to our solution so far has been very encouraging. With this seed round and a senior team of advisors in place we are ready to take the company to the next level.”

Says Jukka Sonninen, Chairman of the Board of CollectiveCrunch: “I am very excited to join the team of CollectiveCrunch. We have great plans for the company, in forestry and beyond. We see a tremendous opportunity in bringing a fresh analytical approach to helping our customers manage and grow their business. We also have a great team in place to drive this solution forward, including Kari Liukko and Tuomo Visanko, both experienced forest industry experts.”

Founded by Jarkko Lipponen, Christof Danzl and Rolf Schmitz, CollectiveCrunch is a Finnish firm with offices in Espoo, Berlin and Munich.

Other investors in the seed round include Gorilla Ventures and angel investors from Finland, Germany, Ireland and South Korea.

The seed investment round was also covered by the Finnish business weekly Talouselämä on Sep 19, 2017 (article in Finnish).


About CollectiveCrunch:
CollectiveCrunch (www.collectivecrunch.com) utilizes state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms to collect and process technical, climate and geo data for sophisticated future forecast models. The primary fields of activity of CollectiveCrunch are Smart Forestry and Logistics, where it helps optimize for instance the timing of wood harvesting and transport. CollectiveCrunch is a Finnish company with offices in Espoo, Berlin and Munich.