AI Monitoring the Health of Pumps and Motors

Artificial Intelligence does to industrial machinery what a doctor does to a human patient. The latter detects the patient's vital parameters to treat or prevent illnesses; conversely, Quick Algorithm's proprietary cloud-based software, called Scops.ai, monitors the fundamental values ​​of a piece of machinery such as vibration measurements and energy consumption. In this case, the goal is the early detection of anomalies through an advanced machine-learning system. In this way, Scops.ai can suggest preventive interventions before potential criticalities turn into actual problems, with consequent economic damage to industrial operativity, down to the stoppage of a whole production line.

Quick Algorithm intervenes wherever there is industrial equipment in the form of electric motors, pumps, compressors or conveyor belts, all types in machinery present in large companies as well as in small and medium firms. "We are expanding the sectors covered, from food to pharma, from automotive to the chemical industry," says Francesca Tosi, head of product and board member of the startup incubated by Bocconi for innovation (B4i) and then accelerated by Motor Valley, an accelerator bringing together CDP venture capital, UniCredit and Fondazione Modena, while managed by CRIT and Plug and Play, also in the quality of investors. Focusing on flexibility and scalability, "the service we offer has allowed us to enter foreign markets such as the US, the United Kingdom, Germany and the United Arab Emirates. We estimate we closed 2024 with revenues up 50% from €385,000 in 2023. In the new year, moreover, we will prepare a new fundraising round, expected to be in the last months of 2025."

Thanks to Scops.ai, Quick Algorithm aims to reduce costs and improve the operational efficiency of industrial plants, decreasing energy consumption by 15% and unexpected production downtime by 30-40% on average. But, according to Tosi, “at the software level, our algorithms are constantly improving, identifying potential problems and related solutions with increasing accuracy and precision. The occurrence of false alarms is now minimal. And from a hardware point of view, we have started to produce our own wireless vibration sensors internally, specifically designed for industrial machinery including pumps, electric motors and compressors. In this way, we are riding the growing IoT (Internet of Things) sensor market.” The next steps? “We are expanding the applications of our technology and developing additional sensors to meet specific industry needs,” replies the head of product at Quick Algorithm pointing out that the entire IoT industry is experiencing fast growth, supported by industrial plans such as Transition 5.0, although she is quick to point out that “in our business, technology does not replace humans, but rather enables functions that would have been previously costly and difficult to perform, given the vast amount of data coming from different sources. Just think of the commitment it would be needed in terms of human resources to monitor all this information every day and have the ability to infer clues about upcoming anomalies.”