Caterpillar Signs Safety Solutions Deal With Silicon Valley Firm

Caterpillar Inc. on Monday (Sept. 14) inked a deal with Silicon Valley-based Seeing Machines to develop and market new in-cab operator fatigue and distraction monitoring solutions for the manufacturing and farming giant’s fleet of industrial equipment.

Seeing Machines currently builds image-processing technology that tracks the movement of a person’s eye, face, head and facial expressions. The technology makes a regular camera intelligent, able to evaluate each facial movement, process it, and then interpret this data to better understand a person’s behaviors, company officials said.

Under the global product development, licensing and distribution agreement deal, Caterpillar will take over responsibility for manufacturing, marketing and sales of Seeing Machines’ existing Driver Safety Systems (DSS) rugged off-road product. Caterpillar will also have distribution rights for Seeing Machines Fleet product.

Caterpillar said it will pay Seeing Machines $17.5 million over four years as well as royalty fees for hardware, software licensing, monitoring and analytics services. Caterpillar will also purchase existing inventory of DSS units from Seeing Machines. Current DSS customer agreements will be transitioned to Caterpillar and supported by Caterpillar dealers.

“This is a pivotal moment in the history of Seeing Machines; the realization of several years of hard work for both companies,” said Seeing Machines CEO Ken Kroeger said. “Caterpillar is capable of maximizing the return on the DSS technology; their reputation, reach, capability and commitment will deliver great outcomes for both companies and for the world’s mining and construction related companies.”

In May 2013, Seeing Machines and Caterpillar Global Mining entered into a four-phased alliance agreement to deliver and support DSS operator fatigue monitoring technology through global Caterpillar dealers. As part of the deal with the Peoria, Ill.-based manufacturing giant, Seeing will continue to work with Caterpillar’s wholly owned subsidiary Electro Motive Diesel to assess and develop operator monitoring technology solutions for the rail industry.

Caterpillar’s deal with Seeing Machines, based in Mountain View, Calif., is part of the Fortune 100 company’s continuing efforts to bridge the gap between manufacturing technologies and the emerging area of artificial intelligence and predictive analytics.

In the spring, Caterpillar announced its entrance into the data analytics industry with the formation of a new division called Analytics & Innovation or AI, which incidentally is synonymous in the data world with “artificial intelligence.”

In late June, Caterpillar said it and Grand Rapids-based Modustri will work together to develop innovations that enhance customers of the agri and farming giant to measure wear on parts and optimize their fleets more effectively.