The Awareness Company founders (Image Credits: The Awareness Company
South Africa-based Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) startup, The Awareness Company (TACo), has secured $1.6 million in a seed funding round. Investors like NEXT176, Holocene, Catalyst Fund, E Squared, Aions, and Jozi Angels all participated in the funding round, reflecting an increasing investor confidence in TACo’s mission to transform business data into actionable insights for operational sustainability.
The Awareness Company (TACo) was founded in 2018 by Priaash Ramadeen, Shazia Vawda, and Estelle Lubbe, who were engineers turned entrepreneurs. TACo aims to make data more accessible and meaningful for businesses. Having onboarded over 50 B2B customers and forged partnerships with the United Nations and Microsoft, TACo seems to be gaining significant traction. TACo has also represented South African startups on global stages, including events in Paris and Dublin.
The new funding will be injected into marketing and sales initiatives, along with improving the artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities of HYDRA, TACo’s AI-powered platform. HYDRA integrates data from various sources, systems, and sensors, giving businesses a cost-efficient and streamlined approach to decision-making. It has been able to reduce technical costs by up to 95%, aiming to revolutionize sustainability practices and bridge critical gaps in energy, water, security, assets, finance, climate, and compliance.
“This funding marks a significant milestone for us as we continue to innovate in the operational sustainability space. With our new investors, our support has grown and there is belief in our vision by people who want to push boundaries. This is just the start,” said Priaash Ramadeen, Co-founder and CEO of The Awareness Company.
Tramayne Monaghan, Chief Ventures Officer at NEXT176, expressed confidence in the company’s potential: “We are thrilled to be backing the amazing team behind The Awareness Company. As an investor, we are committed to funding innovative solutions that allow businesses and people to make more data-driven decisions that drive scalable impact. HYDRA epitomises this ethos, and we cannot wait to see how this and future products scale across Africa.”
Maëlis Carraro, Managing Partner at Catalyst Fund, corroborated this statement, saying: “We are so excited to support The Awareness Company and their visionary team, whose innovative HYDRA platform is revolutionising how organisations leverage data for meaningful sustainability outcomes.”
Josh Romisher, CEO of Holocene, remarked: “As the initial investor, we backed a mission-driven, climate-conscious team building software that empowers customers to save money and resources by tracking and reacting to real-time data. This alignment of people, profit, and planet is at the heart of both organisations.”
TACo’s innovative approach to operations and scalability already highlights the immense potential and allure the company is bound to hold in the future. This new capital will help it solidify its operations base in South Africa, while drawing up expansion plans at the same time.
