Tire health has a huge impact on a truck’s fuel efficiency and safety on the road.
And yet, with all of the arguably sexier solutions out there offering driver assist features and self-driving software, tires don’t get the attention they deserve. At least, so says Ron Lee, the head of business development at BANF, a startup that builds hardware and software to monitor tire health.
Korea-based BANF, which stands for Begin A New Feature, uses sensors to collect data on tire pressure, temperature, tread wear, wheel alignment, and even lug nut stability. That data is analyzed using machine learning to provide drivers and fleet managers with insights about not only tire health, but also cargo load measurement and road surface conditions. Lee says BANF’s insights are up to 90% accurate, and are useful to everyone from fleet management companies to OEMs to departments of transportation.
“Tires are the sole point of contact with the road,” Lee told TechCrunch. “We’re not saying that we’re replacing vision-based methodologies of capturing potholes or road conditions, but we’re more of a complementary solution. We are more accurate at capturing road coefficient and also the depths of potholes, which is one of the key indexes that road management needs to know because they have limited budgets, so they have to know where to prioritize.”
The four-year-old startup, which has operations in Korea and China and plans to launch in Texas, is coming online at a time when autonomous trucks are gaining a foothold on highways.
“Autonomous vehicles, their aim is to run 24/7 to maximize profit, which means more tire stress,” Lee said, noting that electric vehicles are also heavier due to their batteries, which can wear down tires. “Tire data will be even more important in the future.”
Tire incumbents have embraced smart tire tech in recent years, and they’ve found customers in AV startups. May Mobility and Kodiak Robotics both rely on Bridgestone’s in-wheel sensors and predictive algorithms for tire-health monitoring, and Gatik relies on Goodyear’s road-friction detection technology. Bridgestone invested in startup Tyrata, a tire sensor and data management company, in 2022, and Goodyear-backed Tactile Mobility, which uses virtual sensors and cloud computing to estimate tire grip, in 2021.
BANF, which is competing in the TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 Startup Battlefield, has a somewhat different solution from others in the industry. The main piece of its hardware offering is a “triaxis” sensor that’s mounted to the inner liner of the tire and measures motion and forces along the X-axis, or length of the truck, like acceleration or deceleration; captures Y-axis side-to-side movement, like when the truck is turning or swerving; and measures the Z-axis, or up-and-down motion, of the truck, like bumps and road vibrations.
The sensor also has pressure and temperature sensors, and can send raw data via Bluetooth to the next bit of hardware in BANF’s stack, the “smart profiler.”
The profiler acts as a transmitter, receiver, and charger all in one. It attaches to the truck’s mud flap and is connected to the vehicle’s battery so it can provide wireless power and a continual power supply to the sensors. It also facilitates the transfer of sensor data to wherever the client wants to receive that data, whether that be telematic devices, fleet management devices, or even to the vehicle’s onboard system for real-time monitoring and analysis.
The whole system costs $50 per vehicle per month, says Lee. He also said BANF’s tech could save fleet owners up to $4,500 per truck annually on fuel consumption and tire maintenance.
BANF is currently collaborating with Volvo Group, Hyundai Motor Group, and DHL on various projects. Lee says BANF’s tech is currently on 123 vehicles, including four passenger vehicles, with the rest on Class 8 trucks operating in Sweden, the U.S., India, Korea, and China.
The executive said BANF is working with major tire manufacturers in the U.S. to commercialize the startup’s tech via a profit-sharing agreement by the end of 2026.
BANF raised a $5 million pre-Series A last year, and is close to closing a $12 million Series A round, according to Lee. BANF aims to begin trading on Korea’s stock exchange at the end of 2027, and then try its hand at a U.S. Nasdaq IPO. But Lee said BANF is open to other exit opportunities.
“We have many exit options, and not just to the tire companies,” Lee said. “We could be very beneficial to commercial vehicle manufacturers to win over market share. And also fleet management companies, telematic device companies, even insurance companies.”
