Countries all across the world have felt the devastating effects of wildfires. And the problem’s only intensified recently: 2020, 2021, and 2023 were three of the four worst years for wildfires on record.
One German startup is tackling the problem by developing a system for detecting wildfires earlier—when they’re still in the smoldering phase and can be more easily extinguished. Stephan Beyer, the newly minted CFO of Dryad, spoke with CFO Brew about his company’s innovative approach to wildfire detection and his strategies for growth.
How Dryad sniffs out fires: Dryad’s system, Beyer explained, consists of three parts: solar-powered sensors mounted on trees “smell” gasses that can indicate smoke; a mesh network collects data from the sensors and uploads it to the cloud; Dryad’s AI, which has been trained on samples of burnt flora from each forest the sensors are installed in, analyzes the findings and alerts customers if it spots a fire.
The advantage of the Dryad network is speed. It can pinpoint fires within the first 60 minutes, Beyer said, unlike more traditional approaches to detection. Cameras, for instance, can only detect smoke once it rises above the forest canopy, Beyer said, at which point the fire that caused it might have been burning for several hours. Satellites only scan an area once every six hours, he noted, though Dryad does partner with satellite companies to help transmit data in remote areas.
About 50 pilot-phase Dryad systems have been installed in several different countries. They’ve already been proven effective: A Dryad network in Lebanon, for instance, alerted a customer to a farmer’s illegal burning of grapevines.
Various types of customers are piloting Dryad: California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, the UK’s National Trust, telecom companies Vodafone and Mada, and municipalities like the town of Troina, Italy, to name a few.
A CFO with a mission: When asked what he did to prepare for his role at Dryad, which he first took in July 2024, Beyer quips, “Oh, it just took me 20 years.” His background does make him well-suited to the startup, though: He’s an engineer with a Ph.D. in finance; has experience in hardware, having co-founded a 3D printing company; and has worked in venture capital and as a CFO and CEO. “One thing that I always love doing,” he said, “is building great, global, relevant companies with technology.”
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Dryad’s mission also speaks to him personally. He saw the destruction caused by bushfires in Australia firsthand. “I was flying from Melbourne to Sydney, and you could just see smoke all over. It was unbelievable: people losing their homes and farms, and animals getting killed,” he recalled. When the opportunity arose to join Dryad, he said to himself, “‘I want to be part of this mission, and I want to put my experience and my networks and everything I have to work in this environment.’”
Raising the green: His first weeks on the job felt very familiar to him, he said: He was at an organization in a “growth phase” and identified some “inefficiencies” he could remedy. He worked to improve the company’s finance systems and controls to prepare to scale up. His goals for the next 12 months are to increase the size of Dryad’s installations and introduce the technology to a wider audience. To do that, he plans to build out the company’s functions in several areas, including sales, marketing, logistics, deployment, and customer success.
And, naturally, he’ll focus on raising capital. Though it’s possible that Dryad could grow organically, Beyer said, he feels an urgency to address the wildfire problem. Seeking outside capital, he said, will help the company scale more quickly.
“Fundraising is always a challenge, no matter what,” he said. “I’ve done it maybe 100 times in my life and every fundraiser is different. I would say you never walk out of the process in the same way you walk into the process.” But Beyer’s confident that this is Dryad’s moment. “There’s investors looking for impact-driven technology companies, and this is what we are,” he said. “We’re doing our very best to get the right investors on board for us.”
In the meantime, he’ll enjoy his new role. “It’s a privilege. You’re having fun while doing something good for the planet and people,” he said.