News & Press Releases

Press Release April 25, 2024

Athena Intelligence to Discuss Artificial Intelligence and Prefire Wildfire Assessment at Tribal GIS Conference

Recognizing the pivotal role of tribal GIS specialists, David Sypnieski speaks at the 14th Annual National Tribal GIS conference on artificial intelligence and prefire, wildfire risk to enhance community resilience. By leveraging cutting-edge technology and giving tribal business leaders the tools to incorporate community-based insights, augmented intelligence can be used to mitigate wildfires and make communities more resilient.

Press Release April 10, 2024

Athena Intelligence Joins the Resilient Infrastructure +Secure Energy (RISE) Consortium™

Athena Intelligence announced today it has joined the Resilient Infrastructure + Secure Energy (RISE) Consortium™, a group of over 500 companies working to address energy security and increase theresiliency of the domestic energy infrastructure.  The mission of the RISE Consortium™ is to address the energy security and climate crises by reimagining how the United States uses, generates, transports, and stores energy, as well as how we build efficient, and resilient infrastructure.

Press Release March 22, 2024

Voice of the Acre® Coverage Expanded to Include Idaho and Wyoming, Encompassing 41% of the Continental U.S.

Athena Intelligence announces the wildfire risk for 2024 for more than 40% of land in the continental US has been completed, with the addition of Idaho and Wyoming. To meet the needs of electric utilities and communities with current CWPPs, Athena’s profiling now includes every structure, address, census block, census track, city, county, and zip code in Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.

Podcast with Team Wildfire, February 16, 2024

Conversation with Athena Intelligence's Founder, David Sypnieski

Steve Wolf hosts The Fire Break Podcast. He has a 45 minute Q&A with David Sypnieski on the topic of "What is the Land Telling Us?" and Athena's Voice of the Acre®.

Press Release February 10, 2024

Bintel Introduces Dynamic Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPP), Leveraging Athena Intelligence’s Conditional Risk Assessment Maps

Bintel, a leading provider in geospatial intelligence solutions, is delighted to announce the launch of comprehensive Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP) project services across the western United States. Collaborating with Athena Intelligence and integrating their advanced conditional, artificial intelligence, wildfire risk assessment tool, Bintel aims to assist communities in wildfire risk management and mitigation strategies.

Press Release  January 30, 2024

VegaMX and Athena Intelligence Formalize FireTech Collaboration Efforts

Building upon the success of their collaborative efforts during the NASA SBIR grant process, VegaMX and Athena Intelligence are pleased to announce the formalization of their strategic alliance.  VegaMX, a leading data vendor, offers cutting-edge tools in weather data, satellite imagery, artificial intelligence, and machine language, empowering organizations to tackle challenges such as wildfire risk. Athena Intelligence specializes in integrating data from various sources to create profiles that accurately depict wildfire risk, aiding utilities, insurance companies, municipalities, and financial investors in making informed decisions.

Press Release November 30, 2023

VegaMX Consortium Contender for NASA SBIR Ignite!

Athena International proudly announces its participation in a consortium, spearheaded by VegaMX, that has emerged as one of four runners-up from a pool of over 150 applicants for a prestigious grant from NASA under the SBIR Ignite! program. The consortium, driven by VegaMX's innovative use of satellite imagery, weather data, artificial intelligence, and machine language tools, aims to address the substantial costs associated with wildfires, estimated at $800 billion per year.

Press Release November 18, 2023

Geography 2050 Symposium Presentation by Athena Intelligence

Athena Intelligence announces its participation in Geography 2050 conference hosted by the American Geographical Society (AGS). The conference, a strategic dialog on the evolving trends that will reshape the geography of our planet in the coming decades, provided a platform for Athena Intelligence to showcase its groundbreaking geospatial algorithm, Voice of the Acre®, focused on wildfire risk.

Press Release November 2, 2023

Athena Intelligence Expands Area Covered to 35% of the Continental U.S.

Athena Intelligence, a leader in prefire wildfire risk assessment, has expanded the coverage of its artificial intelligence tool, Voice of the Acre®, to include Texas and New Mexico. This strategic move responds to growing client demand, increasing the total number of states covered to eight and encompassing 35% of the continental United States.

Press Release October 15, 2023

Athena Voice of the Acre Vers 1.3 Wildfire Risk Assessment for Utilities

Athena Intelligence, unveiled Voice of the Acre® version 1.3, an advanced artificial intelligence wildfire risk assessment tool specifically tailored for electric utilities. Shifting from individual property assessments to large landscapes, the new version provides comprehensive insights into terrain conditions, addressing the unique challenges faced by electric utilities in minimizing the impact of ignition events.

Press Release July 6, 2023

Athena Intelligence Achieves Another Significant Milestone in Wildfire Risk Assessment

Sacramento, CA – July 7, 2023 – Athena Intelligence, the trailblazing Prefire Insurtech company, announces a major milestone in its artificial intelligence wildfire risk assessment tool (Voice of the Acre®, version 1.2). Responding to the demand from a prospective client in the property insurance industry, the company has expanded its coverage to include two additional western states – Montana and Utah. This strategic move elevates the total number of states with fully fingerprinted wildfire risk data to six, showcasing Athena Intelligence's commitment to comprehensive risk analysis.

Press Release  June 26, 2023

Athena’s Voice of the Acre®| Medium

Athena Intelligence is a prefire data vendor. The new buzzword is FireTech.

Insurance investors see Athena as an “insurance-adjacent” InsurTech. Investors focused on power companies see Athena as part of the CleanTech or EnergyTech startup community. But the overarching corporate goal is to help “the land” share insights about its conditions, as clearly as possible, for humans to use in business decisions.

Press Release  June 14, 2023

Randy Lyle, Founder of Wildfire Mitigation Strategies, Joins Athena Intelligence as Advisor

Athena Intelligence, a leading data vendor specializing in geospatial intelligence for wildfire risk assessment, is thrilled to announce the addition of Randy Lyle to its team. As a Principal at Wildfire Mitigation Strategies, Randy brings over 45 years of unparalleled expertise in wildland fire control and utility fire programs, making him a valuable asset to Athena Intelligence.

Press Release  May 29, 2023

Athena Intelligence Joins ESRI Startup Program to with Prefire Wildfire Solutions

Athena Intelligence, a forefront innovator in wildfire risk assessment, is excited to announce its acceptance into the prestigious ESRI Startup Program. This collaboration marks a significant milestone for Athena Intelligence, reinforcing its commitment to making its probabilistic projections of prefire risk accessible to business users.  Working with the ArcGIS platform will leverage the cutting-edge technology which addresses the complex challenges of conditional prefire algorithms.

Press Release March 13, 2023

Athena Intelligence Announces Strategic Investment by The Mahoney Group

Athena Intelligence, a leading InsurTech wildfire risk analysis company, today announced the closing of a strategic investment by The Mahoney Group. This investment extends Mahoney Group’s leadership as a forward-thinking partner in the world’s largest privately held insurance brokerage group, Assurex Global.

Press Release February 14, 2023

Athena Intelligence Achieves Milestone with MVP Groundbreaking Artificial Intelligence Wildfire Risk Assessment

Athena Intelligence, an emerging player in the InsurTech arena, proudly announces a significant breakthrough with the launch of its revolutionary geospatial artificial intelligence/machine learning tool for assessing wildfire risk. This groundbreaking solution provides property insurers with an accurate and quantitative measure of the risk for a property being within the footprint of a wildfire, projecting a full year in advance across four key Western states. The software delivers a precise probability of loss for every structure in California, Colorado, Arizona, and Washington.

Press Release  January 29, 2023

Emilio Figueroa Joins Athena Intelligence as InsurTech Advisor

Athena Intelligence proudly welcomes Emilio Figueroa, a distinguished global insurance innovation thought leader, to its team as an InsurTech advisor. With an illustrious career spanning 33 years in the property/casualty industry, Emilio has consistently demonstrated expertise in insurance program creation, risk management, and innovative solutions across various insurance verticals.

Press Release  November 14, 2022

Athena Intelligence Welcomes Joseph Chaghouri as Lead Data Scientist

Athena Intelligence, a leading data vendor specializing in geospatial intelligence for wildfire risk assessment, proudly announces the appointment of Joseph Chaghouri as Lead Data Scientist. With a distinguished background in geospatial data science and machine learning, Joseph brings significant experience to Athena Intelligence. In his most recent role at Lawrence Livermore Labs, he played a pivotal role in developing machine learning geospatial models, including regression, Bayesian modeling, and random forests, to enhance data quality. Notably, he created decision tree classifier models for fire spread prediction.

Press Release   February 3, 2021

Plug and Play North Dakota Announces 14 Startups Selected for Its Agtech Batch 3 - Plug and Play Tech Center

Plug and Play North Dakota has announced 14 startups that were selected for batch three of their new AgTech Program. This program aims to facilitate opportunities for pilots, POCs, and new relationships between the selected batch startups and Plug and Play's global ecosystem. Founding partners of the program include Microsoft, Bremer Bank, CHS, and OCP Group. The startups, chosen by partners of the program, represent a variety of new agriculture-specific innovations focused on soil sensing and analysis, field monitoring, precision farming, automation, and sustainability.

Athena unlocks valuable data that ultimately changes how and where food is produced. Utilizing a combination of proprietary processes and AI. Athena delivers unique operational predictions for food, agriculture, and insurance industries.

Athena Intelligence Joins the Resilient Infrastructure + Secure Energy (RISE) Consortium