Brightband Secures $10 Million To Enhance Weather Forecasting With AI

According to Odaily, a startup named Brightband, founded by a former Google executive, aims to leverage artificial intelligence to improve weather forecasting. The company announced on Thursday that it has raised $10 million in Series A funding, led by Prelude Ventures. Other investors include Future Back Ventures, a subsidiary of Bain Capital, and Carl Henderson, co-founder of Slack. Brightband was launched this summer by former Google executive Julian Green and three scientists with the goal of developing a paid product and an open-source AI prediction model trained on raw weather observations. Brightband's co-founder, Amy McGovern, a professor of computer science and meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, stated in an interview that the company will initially focus on predicting extreme weather events, such as heatwaves and tropical cyclones, several days in advance compared to traditional forecasts.