Sierra Innovations Closes Pre-Seed Investment Tranche in SimpleSense

Reno, Nevada -- Sierra Innovations (SI) today announced the close of SimpleSense’s tranche of pre-seed funding. Sierra Innovations along with individual members invested $135,000 to close the $230,000 tranche of pre-seed funding.

“Northern Nevada's innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystem is rapidly expanding,” commented Bob Goff, founder and CEO of Sierra Angels and co-founder of SI. “We created Sierra Innovations two years ago to combine experiential mentoring and pre-seed funding to enable conceptual to early formation startups to become successful, high growth companies.”

Leonard Lafrance, an early investor in SimpleSense, co-founded SI in 2016. “Raising funds is the hardest when companies are at a very early stage. We created SI to support them at this risky stage and to create a strong entrepreneurial ecosystem in northern Nevada.”

SimpleSense is currently testing their technology with first responders in communities across the U.S. to measure operational improvements in response times for facility evacuation in the case of a fire or active shooter incident.

Mark Lorkowski, co-founded SimpleSense and heads partnerships. “Raising outside either coast is difficult, but not impossible. We’ve been lucky to find communities, like Reno, Nevada, that support early-stage entrepreneurs.”

SimpleSense was founded at the InNEVator IoT accelerator in Reno, Nevada, in 2017. Their sensor-software solution detects human presence. Data collected is anonymous and complies with all privacy standards.

Investors in this tranche included Sierra Innovations, the Secure Erie Accelerator, a security-focused program run by Singularity University out of Erie, Penn., and other angel investors.

About Sierra Innovations

Sierra Innovations, formed by 33 members of the Sierra Angels in 2016, offers diverse, highly experienced talent from successful entrepreneurs and corporate executives with a focus on funding early stage companies. Sierra Innovation’s mission is to facilitate and assist the transformation of innovative and scalable startups into successful growth companies in Northern Nevada. We collaborate with Northern Nevada’s leading programs that include a close partnership with University of Nevada, Reno, other Angel Groups and colleagues and many private sector entities.

About SimpleSense

SimpleSense, founded at the InNEVator IoT accelerator in Reno, Nevada, in 2017. Their sensor technology provides smart routing to spots of interest for security, first responders, and military operations, using sensor fusion and intelligent algorithms to reduce response time and to provide actionable situational awareness. Decentralized, consensus-based configuration and communication enable off-grid capabilities when wide area networks are not available.