From self-driving vehicles to delivery drones to health monitors, Historic Murphy Avenue in Sunnyvale offered a little 21st-century innovation to its lunch crowd on Oct. 3. The city’s Tech Business Expo featured Sunnyvale-based companies showcasing their innovative products.
Longtime Sunnyvale business Acellent Technologies was there to talk about its new products and how it’s branching out into other industries. For more than 25 years, Acellent has served as “doctors for assets” for multiple industries, including the airline industry.
“So, we can really help those companies with testing and streamlining, kind of reducing maintenance costs and reducing downtime,” said Grant Chang, Acellent’s Chief Operating Officer.
Chang says AI is helping the company go even further with its work.
“We do predictive maintenance, so we really help catch all these issues before the issues arise,” said Chang.
Representatives from NASA were also in attendance, highlighting potential business partnerships with nearby NASA Ames and the rest of the space agency.
“I’m trying to let them know what they can some of them can do to work with us, and also what we’re looking for,” said Christine Munroe, a business specialist with NASA.
Munroe says that NASA isn’t just looking to work with local tech companies, but everything else that helps a business run.
Sonal Tambe, president of NimbleHeart, knows firsthand what those partnerships can be like. The company’s heart monitor was initially used on NASA astronauts before receiving FDA approval.
“Some of the testing that was done by NASA was used by the FDA in approving our technology,” said Tambe.
Now, NimbleHeart works with individuals for cardio monitoring.
Polar Labs showed off its self-driving delivery vehicle. Sized like a miniature car, the vehicle is designed to drive in the bicycle lanes.
“It’s not a full-blown passenger vehicle, but it’s also not one of those little sidewalk robots you’ve probably seen,” said Kaitlyn, an operations project manager with Polar Labs. “Because we are operating in bike lanes, we operate as a cyclist fluid on roads. So, this robot does have the ability to drive in shared car lanes. It can also hop onto sidewalks if it needs to.”
While the vehicle is still in its testing phase, the company hopes it will be road ready soon.
Representatives from Fremont High School’s robotics team were also among the presenters, showing off two of the robots the school took to competitions last season. With nearly 100 students involved and multiple robots built each year, the Firebirds felt attendance at the Tech Business Expo served a dual purpose.
“One reason we’re here was because we want to be more involved in the community,” said Fremont High School junior Kalash Venkumahanti. “But it is also pretty expensive. This is a $7,000 robot. So, we’re also looking for funding opportunities.”
Other businesses at the event included Waymo, the self-driving cars seen frequently around San Francisco and Matternet, a company geared toward drone delivery.
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