An Alabama startup that provides virtual expertise software for surgeons and home repair technicians alike has closed an $8 million Series A that was fueled, in part, by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Help Lightning, based in Birmingham, announced on Thursday that it closed the $8 million Series A investment led by Baltimore’s Resolve Growth Partners. The fund raise was greatly accelerated by the Covid-19 pandemic, Help Lightning CEO Gary York said. Help Lightning has seen “an extraordinary spike in demand,” as technicians, for example, are no longer able to physically travel to locations where their expertise is required.
Usage has grown about 535 percent between February and June alone.
“Prior to the pandemic, [this] market was already growing by 70 percent year-over-year according to some analysts, and we were growing faster than that,” York said. “So we had a great 2019, and the first two months of 2020 were looking good. Then the pandemic hit and things took off.”
How Help Lightning Works
When someone encounters a complex issue, they need an expert to be onsite immediately. With Help Lightning’s virtual expertise software, two video streams become merged into one. Therefore, users can collaborate and resolve an issue together. The remote expert can actually insert their hand, use tools, and share documents. This simplifies the problem-solving process. Easy, right?
Using mobile devices, experts can now work with a partner as though they were side-by-side. You can telestrate, or write across the screen. It’s easy to freeze images and use hand gestures. You can even import documents and add real objects into the merged reality environment. So, using Help Lightning, experts can solve any problem, even from thousands of miles away.
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