TruWeather Solutions Helps Weather-Sensitive Businesses Cut Costs
BY TERRY STACKHOUSE ALBANY/CAPITAL REGION
PUBLISHED 12:20 AM ET JAN. 18, 2018
Weather can have a big impact on a business’s bottom line, especially this time of year. From a small office in the sub-basement of the UAlbany lecture center, TruWeather Solutions works to help weather-sensitive businesses and government agencies recover lost profits.
It’s a veteran-owned company staffed with veterans, including Purple Heart recipient Nathan Green. He keeps the award on his desk.
“I keep it up there as a daily reminder of how precious life is,” said Green.
Green believes precise forecasting can not only save money, but also save lives. Client safety is their top priority. They help companies find out what weather is costing them and develop strategies to save money.
“That could mean providing them a very micro-scale, street-by-street weather forecast. It could be sending them innovative alerts on their phone. It could be helping them alert employees appropriately to weather conditions that are going to affect them,” said Green.
Clients include the South by Southwest festival and the Paul McCartney World Tour. Last summer, they completed a $750,000 project with the government of Thailand, installing weather equipment and teaching employees how to use it.
This winter, TruWeather is working with the Virginia DOT, deploying weather sensors to collect information on road conditions and provide real-time weather alerts — “Road temperature, ambient temperature, as well as the wiper frequency of the car,” said Meghan Conway, a project scientist with TruWeather Solutions.
“We’re collecting that data so we can show that these sensors really are valuable.”
TruWeather is headquartered in Virginia. Tax incentives through Startup New York helped the company bring their operations center to UAlbany. TruWeather is exploring how data can be used in driverless vehicles and how drones can be used in forecasting.
“Hopefully by showing them the impacts that weather has on their day-to-day life, we can make people’s lives better and we can make them more healthy and profitable,” said Green.
