On World Drowning Prevention Day, Omer Bar-Ilan and Eyal Amit, the founders of Lynxight, shared their vision for improving aquatics safety.
What were you doing before you launched Lynxight?
I’m Omer Bar-Ilan, CEO of Lynxight. I’ve been running operations for the past ten years or so. Before launching Lynxight, I was with @Rafael, one of Israel’s largest defense companies. I’ve been involved with several other startups too.
I’m Eyal Amit. I handle all the commercial activities for the company. I also love the startup space. Before co-launching Lynxight, I was with FieldIn, an ag-tech startup.
What does Lynxight do?
Lynxight is a service that monitors swimmers in swimming pools. What we do is analyze the behavior of every single person in the water by connecting to existing CCTV cameras to see if there are any drowning incidents or early distress signs. If there is, we send an alert in real-time so that pool staff can immediately respond.
In addition, we collect a lot of different user data and analytics, such as how many people are in the water, how many children, how many adults, what are they doing, and a bunch of other metrics that will later help with ongoing operation and management of the swimming pool.
What made you start Lynxight—a personal passion, a problem you identified, or a market opportunity?
(Omer)
It began with searching for a problem we felt sophisticated AI could solve. Both of us had small kids, so we connected to the water world. We started looking into aquatic liability and lifesaving capabilities in swimming pools. We saw that the existing competition was weak in terms of performance and prices. So, we decided to bring our swimming safety technology to the pool industry.
(Eyal)
I’ve always wanted to join startups or companies that do good in the world. That explains the previous company that I was involved with in the ag tech field. At FieldIn, we were working to reduce the spraying of crops, and now I’m engaged in a different lifesaving cause. Omer and I were intrigued by aquatic risk and felt there was a gap that other companies hadn’t filled. It was a challenge to break into swimming pool safety from a commercial standpoint, but not from a technology standpoint. So Lynxight was a perfect fit from my point of view.
How did you come up with the name “Lynxight?”
That’s a great question because it’s definitely not because we wanted an easy name to spell! But, the Lynx is an animal with magical vision. It can see through objects, walls, and around every corner. And this is what we’re doing—we “see” through a wall of water.
Where would you say you are today regarding brand and product development?
(Omer)
The product right now is fantastic. It has immense value and is much better than anything else on the market right now. But we’re not stopping there. We have significant plans for improvement across all aspects of the product. For example, we are working today to improve the user interface, the dashboard, tactical devices, algorithms, and database.
(Eyal)
We’re growing on all fronts. We’re planning to break into the residential and private space market in a year or sooner. The backbone of our aquatic safety solution is complete. Now we’re working to amplify the uniqueness of our company. For instance, we are the first to offer a SaaS product in the aquatics space. In the future, we want to optimize our offerings for the end users, build collaborations with insurers and develop different value-added resellers.
Is your market global, or are you focusing on specific regions?
Our market is global; there are no geographical boundaries. Currently, we’re operational in seven countries, soon to be eight. Lynxight is a plug-and-play service; therefore, if a facility has the infrastructure, we’re ready to help them improve pool safety.
Who are your customers?
Our target audience is organizations that manage commercial swimming pools open to the public. This includes municipalities, fitness centers, hotels, community centers, and elderly care centers. Essentially, any publicly-accessible, non-residential swimming pool center is a potential client. We’re currently focused on multi-site, multi-pool organizations that operate swimming pool centers, such as large cities around the world. But, this also includes community organizations such as the YMCA and JCC, fitness chains such as Holmes Places in Israel, Lifetime Fitness, David Lloyd in the UK, and hotel chains such as Dan, Fattal, and more.
We’re also starting to collaborate with insurance companies. They would not be end-users, but the idea is to work together to improve swimming pool safety. For example, we are working right now with insurance companies in Israel to give facility managers a complete package of insurance and aquatic safety.
What is your vision for the future?
(Eyal)
Safety is a right; not a privilege is something that I personally believe in. So, it’s not just a tagline we use on our website copy. I want to make that vision a reality. I think it’s totally doable. So, it’s more than just providing a service.
I would like to see us create a community around safety standards. Then, maybe Lynxight can be the hub for swimming safety good practices. In the future, I see us collaborating with the Red Cross, International Lifesaving Federation, and other global organizations.
We want to do everything we can to raise the bar; yes, of course, at the end of the day, we sell a service. But our vision is way beyond selling and increasing revenue. And, I believe we’re just touching the tip of what will become an enormous global effort to bring a holistic, high-tech solution to eliminate drownings.
(Omer)
I agree with what Eyal said. I believe that Lynxight is in a position to eradicate drowning. Drowning, the second leading cause of death in children, is preventable. Lynxight is able and ready to tackle this challenge of saving kids’ lives. In five years, we’ve made great strides toward this goal.
(Eyal)
And even more, the future of artificial intelligence in aquatics safety and swimming pool management is endless. Right now, we’re focused on using AI to prevent drowning. But, once we have cameras with brains, we can do much more than simply analyze swimmer behavior.
For example, the Lynxight technology can train staff, analyze energy consumption, one of the biggest topics today, and improve general operations, including staff management, cleaning schedule, and supplies.
We’re already having serious discussions with major players worldwide about bringing the complete package of AI-powered services.
Right now, we’re focused on our primary objective-aquatics safety and drowning prevention. But, our eyes are on the next moves, whether insurance or developing AI for other categories within the aquatics space.
Thank you so much, Omer and Eyal. Do you have any closing comments?
We’re so appreciative of our early customers in Israel, Norway, Germany, and Australia, who shared our vision, saw the potential, wanted to be a part of the journey and had the patience to work through the initial kinks. We couldn’t have done it without them.
We’d also like to shout out to our incredible staff who bring their best to work every day, staying as long as it takes to help us meet our mission.
Of course, we wouldn’t be where we are without our supportive board and the investors who give not only money but also invest in our team and staff.
We’re continuing to evolve as a company. We’ve come a long way from when we launched. We are fortunate to work with an amazing team. We’ve worked hard to connect everyone to the mission, no matter the role, to see the bigger picture, and we believe you can see the fruits of those efforts today.