18 Nov AURA secures R62m Series A funding deal

AURA – an African-based security and medical response marketplace, has secured R62m in a Series A funding round led by MultiChoice Group, KLT Holdings and Buffet Investments.

Founded by Warren Myers, Ryan Green and Adam Pantanowitz, AURA enables anyone to access their closest vetted private and public security response unit to their location via a connected device.

Myers said: “South Africa has one of the most advanced private security and emergency response industries which has the capacity to ensure safety to a greater number of people who might not currently have access to it.

“AURA enables seamless and affordable ways for anyone to get immediate and trusted access to both private and public emergency response resources in an emergency, creating a world where everyone is safe.”

AURA already has over 400,000 active users and has recently expanded into East Africa and the UK. The new funding will help it realise its ambitions for further growth. The company currently has around 50 members of staff and plans to double its staff over the next 12 months.

Green added: “We are gearing some of the funding towards hiring top talent to head up each new region while growing teams in established regions – especially our tech team. The result is stronger relationships and value propositions for suppliers at all levels in the marketplace.”

According to the company, there are an estimated 7,000 private security response vehicles in South Africa, yet they service only two per cent of the population. In addition, those vehicles are only in operation just five per cent of the time.

“AURA allows the seamless connection of people in distress, whether it’s safety or medical distress, with our network of responders. We aggregate emergency response companies and through our technology solution, we’re able to dispatch responders to any distress signal, anywhere in the country,” said Pantanowitz.

He continued: “The marketplace uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to hone its system and ensure that the closest responders are dispatched to a distress call. This means that AURA response times are reduced because security companies are aggregated and dispatched from one trusted source with a birds-eye view of the situation. Response times drop from an average of 30 minutes to as low as one to five minutes.”