Miami-based artificial intelligence construction company Togal.AI has received the first place prize at Miami Beach’s 2022 eMerge Americas Startup Competition. Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary was a judge and deciding factor in Togal’s April 19 win.
“We are honored and beyond excited to see Togal.AI rank as number one out of thousands of startups worldwide,” the company’s founder and CEO Patrick Murphy said in a statement. “The construction industry is ripe for innovation. With demand higher than ever, Togal.AI is making a huge impact by speeding up the building process.”
Togal.AI uses machine learning to automatically calculate the square footage of plans, labeling of rooms and walls, and updates of construction blueprints. For big projects, which can be hundreds of pages long, this compresses weeks of work into mere seconds.
Thousands of startups across the world applied to enter Miami’s eMerge Americas competition.Togal.AI will receive a $420,000 investment. Murphy pitched Togal’s vision in front of celebrity judges, including Kevin O’Leary of Shark Tank.
“Getting validation from a Shark Tank judge is not only cool, but a sign that Togal.AI is worth investing in,” Murphy said.
The news release states: “Miami has burst into the scene as a new potential tech hub amid the pandemic, with Silicon Valley workers flocking there due to its lax Covid restrictions and lower taxes. According to eMerge, Miami-based firms raked in $5.33 billion in investments in 2021, far more than the $2.27 billion the city brought in in 2020.”