Industry giants invest in UK pet firm PitPat
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Two giants in the pet care industry – Royal & Sun Alliance and Neovia – have expressed clear confidence in the growing “pet telematics” sector through recent equity investments in the UK’s leading provider, Pitpatpet Ltd.
Pet telematics, part of the burgeoning “internet of things” revolution, is the latest application of low-cost, lightweight sensing and measurement technology that generates big data to improve business decision making. (Visit www.pitpatpet.com/telematics for a 90 second video).
PitPat’s activity monitor is a simple and unobtrusive device that securely attaches to any dog’s collar. Working with a free app, it provides owners with an activity goal tailored to their dog, and measures how much exercise they are getting. This simple combination not only delights dog owners, but also promises to change exercise behaviour, just as it has in the human fitness monitor sector. The result could be happier, healthier dogs, and lower costs for dog owners and insurers.
Neovia, a leading global player in nutrition and animal health, invests deeply in innovation, science and research for product development and services. PitPat’s attractive consumer device and highly scalable data service provides Neovia with the capability to analyse data on the detailed exercise and feeding behaviour of hundreds of thousands of dogs. This could unlock new possibilities in dog feeding and other nutritional advances.
Hubert de Roquefeuil, CEO at Neovia commented: “We seized the opportunity to partner with PitPat because it totally fits with our interactive petline innovation field (connected objects and data platforms for dogs, cats and horses). In addition, considering the key positions that Neovia has in France and in the growing international pet food markets in Latin America or Asia, we see significant opportunities to access more accurate data that is valuable for our clients, and to offer the connected propositions we plan to develop.”
Royal and Sun Alliance, owners of the MORETH>N retail brand, had been searching for the right provider of pet telematics technology to help extend their pet insurance offer to support owners in keeping their dogs healthy for longer, and not simply looking after them when they fall ill. PitPat offers RSA an immediate and market-ready solution to that need, allowing them for the first time to extend their successful telematics-based approach in motor insurance into the pet sector.
RSA Global Connected Insurance Director Kenny Leitch said: “It was immediately clear to us that PitPat was the right choice for our pet telematics ambitions. Their intense focus on low-cost and large scale is exactly what’s needed for the insurance market.”
PitPat Founder, CEO and former Dragons’ Den contestant Andrew Nowell said: “We’re delighted to welcome these two industry leaders as investors and partners. Their business insights and access to large-scale markets will help us deliver our current and future products to a global market.”
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