AI-based startup helping India's manufacturing prowess raises $4.2 million

The manufacturing process is automatic in most industries. The companies use Robots, Cobots, and other techniques for making their products but are still doing the quality inspection manually which takes lots of effort, time and money. Even after putting in so much effort, the defective product still reaches to end customer.

This led duo Aniruddha and Avra Banerjee to start SwitchOn, a company that helps precision manufacturing industries drastically reduce their manufacturing defects through the use of one-of-a-kind field-trainable AI system.

Bangalore-based SwitchOn helps manufacturing companies detect their products' faults through AI (artificial intelligence)-powered visual inspection technologies. It automates quality inspection that accelerates quality assurance procedures, eradicating faults in production. The company was started in 2017.

In conversation with ZeeBiz.com, Aniruddha shares features of SwitchOn AI technique, recent fundraising and expansion plans.

"To expand its footprint in the International market, we have raised $4.2 million. The round was led by a Singapore-based fund along with Axilor Ventures, pi Ventures, and prominent angels such as Anuj Bihani, Laxmi Narayan, and others," Aniruddha told in a video interaction.

Use of funds

According to Aniruddha, this investment will allow SwitchOn to continue its rapid growth in India, scale internationally with large enterprises, make key hires in sales and technology, and invest in research and development.

How does SwitchOn help companies to find defective products and lower manufacturing cost?

With their experience in manufacturing industry, Aniruddha and Avra found a major manufacturing defect in bottles. They saw that their clients were producing bottles at a high rate of more than 350 parts per minute, making it impossible to manually examine each bottle. Even the smallest amount of dirt in empty bottles can result in over 6 per cent of production problems in high-speed lines.

"Here is when SwitchOn implemented its AI-powered DeepInspect System and performed a thorough inspection of their clients' high-speed bottling operations within three weeks. Through one-click configuration software, customers may set up the hardware and software, giving them the flexibility to check over 10 SKUs on the fly at more than 350 pieces per minute. It can help customers to do thorough inspection of empty and filled bottles using its AI-powered SwitchOn DeepInspect System after it has been configured," said Aniruddha.

According to him, this impacted the companies to get zero customer complaints about the goods produced at their facility. Moreover, it improved wholesale margins, and the cost of quality was cut by nearly 80 per cent as a result of lower manual inspection costs and regulatory compliance liabilities.

More on SwitchOn

SwitchOn was founded in 2017 by Aniruddha Banerjee, ex-Nvidia and Samsung; and Avra Banerjee, ex-Schneider and Indus. It has global manufacturers as its clients. Some of them include SKF, ITC, and Unilever, among others.

“The company had a revenue of Rs 2 crore in the last financial year and aims to grow it 10x in the next financial year,” Aniruddha told Zeebiz.com, adding that it competes with Indian companies like Qualitas Technologies and with the likes of US-based Elementary. Its AI system cost starts from Rs 3 lakh- Rs 8 lakh per year.

About Axilor

Bangalore-headquartered Axilor Ventures is an early-stage seed fund and startup accelerator that was founded by Infosys co-founders Kris Gopalakrishnan and SD Shibulal. The company invests between $500k-$750k in a startup and makes 8-12 investments per year.

Some of its portfolio companies include Wiz, Brands of Bharat, Locofast, QuickSHoft, Prolance, GoodHome, Metalbook, and CapGrid among others.

pi Ventures and its portfolio

pi Ventures is an early-stage fund focused on investing in disruptive ideas leveraging machine learning, AI, and IoT. Its most recent investment includes in Zero Cow Factory, a biotechnology startup that produces animal-free protein and dairy products.

Some of its other portfolio companies include LimeChat, Locus, Wysa, Pixis, Agnikul, Preimage, and Zenatix among others.

Manufacturing sector in India

In March 2023, the S&P Global India Manufacturing PMI (compiled by by S&P Global) increased to 56.4, a three-month high, above market expectations of 55.0. The speed of growth in new orders was at 3-month highs, and output increased at a rate that was faster than its long-term average and the fastest since last December. Additionally, export sales increased more quickly than purchases, which increased the highest since May 2022.

By 2030, India may export goods worth US$ 1 trillion, making it the third most sought-after destination for manufacturing in the world.