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Image Credits:Zacua Ventures / Zacua Ventures' team, from left, Mauricio Tessi Weiss, Juan Nieto, Victoria Smith, Vivin Hegde, Margarita de la Pena and Pedro Garcia
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Image Credits:Zacua Ventures / Zacua Ventures' team, from left, Mauricio Tessi Weiss, Juan Nieto, Victoria Smith, Vivin Hegde, Margarita de la Pena and Pedro Garcia
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Theconstruction sector is knownfor its slow embrace of technology . But a new venture capital business firm , funded by some heavyweight legacy construction companies , is out to vary that .
Zacua Ventureshas launched its maiden $ 56 million fund targeting other - stage expression engineering startup , back by 19 of the building sphere ’s biggest corporation . The circumscribed spouse group include Procore , a supplier of construction management software system ; Volvo , a maker of truck , bus and construction equipment ; and sustainable building materials companionship Cemex .
Vivin Hegde , Mauricio Tessi Weiss and Juan Nieto get down San Francisco - base Zacua in 2022 . Hegde was antecedently with grammatical construction tool Almighty Hilti Corp , while Tessi Weiss and Nieto were at Cemex Ventures .
Because the construction industry is dominated by lowly and medium companies , acceptation of engineering has been “ very split , ” said Tessi Weiss , who lay out the European Union and Latin America for Zacua . Finding startups that can accost this is one of the challenges , but also a grown chance , Weiss believes . While many of these companies have digitise paper processes , “ today we see engineering starting in many dissimilar playing field like , AI , industrialized twist , IoT devices and robotics . ”
Construction marketplace Construex takes in first capital to expand in Latin America
With that duty period has arrive more startup developing root . Most recently , Kleiner Perkins led a $ 31 million Series A intoPermitFlow , which direct to “ build the ‘ TurboTax for construction permitting . ’ ” Meanwhile , Buildstock , a B2B marketplace and fintech platform for structure materials , rear $ 1.6 million in pre - seed financial backing last week from a mathematical group of investors , including Precursor , to address one of the manufacture ’s big bother dot of late payments .
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give that the construction industriousness stand for around14 % of universal gross domesticated productand is responsible for give rise 40 % of total world greenhouse gas pedal emissions , Zacua is targeting startup plow sustainability as well as productivity and urbanisation , Tessi Weiss said .
The speculation uppercase firm ’s cooperator , who also have a regional presence in Spain , Mexico and Singapore , appear for inauguration within those three buckets that will , for example , enhance efficiency across construction industriousness ; reduce the atomic number 6 footprint of twist and building process more broadly ; and lead to the development of resilient , intelligent structure that are ideally equipped to serve the cities of the future , said Hegde , who represent North America .
Since the launch of its fund , Zacua Ventures has invested in over a twelve startups across the building applied science ecosystem . Among its portfolio companies isConstruex , an Ecuador - based software package - as - a - service of process marketplace for the construction and design industry . It more recently pass a $ 9 million come round in Flexnode , a data base startup .
“ fire a $ 56 million first - fourth dimension stock in this kind of environment is something that we have n’t seen a slew of people do , and the fact that we ’ve been capable to do it , and in a specific sector , just speaks to the chance that lies ahead , ” Hegde said .
4 laminitis give us their take on what ’s ahead for construction tech
