Arboair's advanced image analysis helps forest owners
Many forest owners do not have access to forest data at a detailed level. At the same time, quality data on conditions in the forest can help promote forestry practices that are more profitable and more sustainable. Arboair's AI-powered image analysis generates real-time, high-precision forest data and can, for example, detect the spread of the European spruce bark beetle.
Of Sweden's total land area, only 3 percent is built-up and developed, while 69 percent is covered by forest. And 45 million tonnes of carbon dioxide are stored in biomass in Sweden's forests every year.
“We often hear that the Amazon is the lungs of the earth, but for us, our forest is extremely valuable and something we need to protect any way that we can”, says Erica Dahlberg, sales manager at Arboair.
The company has developed a software solution that enables seamless, efficient forest management, mainly for forest companies and forest owners. It uses AI-powered image analysis to generate high-quality digital decision-making data for forest owners.
“Storms and invasive insect species, not least the spruce bark beetle, are some of the things that can quickly cause changes. Our platform provides reliable, precise data about real-time conditions. It is significantly less time-consuming than the forest owner having to walk around and do an inspection, and there is a huge difference in accuracy compared to images from Lantmäteriet (authority for land survey) or satellites. With these images, you can only study larger areas with low-resolution data, while our image analysis allows you to examine each individual tree with detailed, high-resolution images”, emphasizes Vice President Jacob Hjalmarsson.
He and CEO Marcus Drugge started Arboair together in 2019.
Identified problems in agriculture
“When Marcus was studying at Linköping University, one of his course assignments was to identify problems in agriculture and try to find solutions to them. After reaching out to farmers, he concluded that the most difficult thing was not farming itself, but managing forest land. We then attended entrepreneur seminars with the Prince Daniels Fellowship, where our ideas were well received”.
The first few years were focused on product development. The company now has ten employees and is setting out to revolutionize the digitalization of the forest industry in key areas.
“The forest companies and forest owners take a video of their forest using a drone. It is the most efficient, economical and sustainable way, and then upload the images to a cloud service for us. Our software/image analysis delivers the results”.
“In 2022, the spruce bark beetle destroyed about half the number of trees as the well-known Gudrun windstorm. If their spread is detected in time, many trees can be saved, which is extremely important for the environment and the climate”, Erica points out.
Current customers are spread all over the country and an international establishment has also been started.
“Our vision is to offer our product to the forest industry worldwide. Forest companies and forest owners who have tried us and seen the degree of efficiency have immediately wanted to sign on as customers”, says Jacob.