Which tree will fall on a live wire and spark a disaster? Overstory’s artificial intelligence already knows. Last week, Fiona Spruill, chief executive of the Amsterdam-based company, announced that it had raised $43 million in a Series B round to expand its wildfire-prevention technology. “We are going for world domination — but carefully,” she said.
On a recent field visit, Overstory’s software identified a dying tree that threatened to topple onto a power cable. A human inspector might have missed it, the client admitted, but the AI did not. That moment captured the company’s point of difference: to use satellite imagery and machine learning to help utilities monitor vegetation around infrastructure, reducing outages and fires.
Founded in 2018 by Indra den Bakker and Anniek Schouten, Overstory began as a tool to track deforestation in tropical forests. Its commercial breakthrough, however, came in the United States, where utilities face a $20 billion problem amid mounting liability from wildfires sparked by downed lines.
“With our latest software, we also help energy companies tackle the moment between the spark and the spread of the fire,” Spruill explained. “If a small spark occurs somewhere, we can indicate exactly where it is most likely to develop into a catastrophic fire. The spark itself does not cause the fire. The fuel around it — shrubs, grasses, dry vegetation — does.”
And whilst its impact is difficult to measure in terms of fires prevented, but utilities report tangible results. A Canadian customer cited a 48 per cent reduction in vegetation-related outages. Now, Overstory is working with six of the 10 largest energy companies in North America, employing more than 80 specialists from 16 nationalities, including machine learning engineers and forestry and fire experts.
California alone has nearly 42,000 kilometres of high-voltage lines and 237,000 kilometres of overhead distribution lines running through fire-prone terrain. Overstory charges utilities an annual fee per mile scanned, a model Spruill describes only as “solid enough that investors were eager to get in.” The round was led by Blume Equity, a European climate fund, with participation from New York-based Energy Impact Partners and existing backers CapitalT, founded by Janneke Niessen and Eva de Mol.
The company has now raised US $69 million across two rounds.
Spruill, an American, moved to Amsterdam five years ago with her husband and two children to join Overstory as its tenth employee. After Den Bakker’s illness and death, she stepped into the role of CEO. “I am really proud that we are such a global company,” she said. “We have Dutch roots, but as far as I’m concerned, we’re no more Dutch than British or American. I myself have an American father and a British mother, and I live here. In that respect, I am the embodiment of that global vision.”
For now, the company remains focused on the United States and Canada, where the problem is most acute. Expansion to Europe and other regions will follow. “In 2021, we decided to focus on the U.S.,” Spruill said. “That is the best place to build the product, partly because the problem was acute there. That’s also where we have the biggest impact. That focus is our superpower: we are going for world domination. But carefully.”
The urgency is growing. Climate change is altering how trees die, drying soils and vegetation, and creating new patterns of risk. Extreme weather, from black ice to heavy storms, can also bring down power lines. Utilities face enormous claims for damages and fatalities linked to wildfires, and are under pressure to reduce risks while keeping electricity affordable. “We mainly hear that they are concerned about reducing risks,” Spruill said. “They are under great pressure to prevent fires, but also to keep the cost of electricity down. Ultimately, every dollar they spend has to have the maximum impact.”
Communities can take years to recover from a major blaze. “It takes a community at least seven years to rebuild everything after a forest fire, like last year in Los Angeles,” Spruill said. “Moreover, every forest fire that we can prevent prevents a huge amount of CO₂ emissions.”
Asked whether the message resonates in Trump’s America, Spruill was diplomatic. “Everyone is in favour of a reliable energy supply and affordable electricity. That has nothing to do with your political preference. We sell products that deliver real value to our customers. It helps energy companies with real problems. We don’t necessarily have to talk about climate change, but it’s what it’s all about.”
Please note: Extracts from this story were originally published on MT/Sprout.
