When Pontus Lindberg left a stressful period in the forestry industry behind him, his thoughts caught up and an idea fell into place.
- "I had long thought about how timber measurement could be done differently and suddenly I knew," says Pontus, who is now developing the idea together with his team.
- Our goal is to make the forest industry more sustainable, while creating Dalarna's next big tech success.
As soon as Pontus Lindberg had formulated his idea, he started doing the math.
- I studied engineering physics and needed to prove my thesis in numbers before I could believe it. But when everything was right, I was convinced, math does not lie.
Pontus asked his good friend and former study buddy Felix Järemo Lawin if he wanted to help develop the idea further. Felix, who has a PhD in computer vision, said yes and in turn suggested a third partner: Andreas Robinson, who also has a PhD in computer vision and who also does research in computer vision and AI.
- That Andreas also wanted to be involved is perfect. Or as business coach Jörgen Bond said during pre-incubation: "This just gets better and better."
Together, the trio formed the company Svepreg, which today has full focus on developing and testing Pontus' idea.
The exact design of the solution is still a secret - the plan is to file a patent application in spring.
- What I can say is that the idea is based on high precision, something that is in demand and is very important when large amounts of wood are to be handled. Here, small errors in measurement can correspond to values worth many millions of kronor," explains Pontus.
Different market
In Sweden, timber bought and sold must be measured in accordance with the Timber Measurement Act. The purpose of the Act is to create a well-functioning timber market where both sellers and buyers have the opportunity to assess whether the remuneration for the timber is correct. The Swedish Forest Agency is the supervisory authority and must check how well companies comply with the legislation.
Today, all major forestry companies use timber measurement services from the economic association Biometria, which thus has something of a monopoly position.
Pontus, Felix and Andreas are aware that they are entering a special market and know that the way forward is through Biometria. The alternative is to sell the solution to operators in other countries.
- We have had an ongoing dialog with Biometria since last autumn, so we will see where it lands. But it's also interesting to look beyond Sweden's borders. In fact, we have already received inquiries from Scotland where they are interested in our idea.
Incubator good growth environment
Svepreg has been part of Dalarna Science Park's incubator program for just over a year. Jörgen Steen is the team's head coach and he sees great benefits in the combination of research and entrepreneurship.
- Deeptech companies like Svepreg make Dalarna's business community more modern and more competitive, so they are very important to us," says Jörgen.
For his part, Pontus is very pleased with the support the team receives and says that it has contributed greatly to Svepreg's rapid development.
- The business coaches are great. They push us outside our comfort zone all the time and ask very relevant questions. It's also thanks to the incubator that we've received innovation funding from Region Dalarna and the great entrepreneurial grant of SEK 200,000 from Åforsk," says Pontus.
The three founders are now looking forward to deploying a full-scale prototype that can collect data over a longer period of time. After that, the team needs to process all the data and further refine the algorithm.
In parallel, Svepreg will seek a strong investment partner with knowledge of the industry.
- We aim to have the first commercial system in operation in less than two years. Dalarna needs a new big tech company and hopefully it will be called Svepreg!
