CivilGrid raises $26M Series A to map what’s buried underground
What’s the deal? CivilGridDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, a startup that maps underground infrastructure for engineers and planners, has raised $26 million in a Series A round led by Spark Capital. Afore Capital, Ford Street VenturesDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, SNR, and Energy Impact PartnersDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → also participated. Founder Josh Mackanic calls the technology a kind of “Google Maps for what’s underground.”
Why now? Mackanic spent a decade as an engineer at Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E)Dealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, where one project stalled after workers found an unknown buried pipe. Identifying its owner and contents took three days and cost about $60,000. He launched CivilGrid in 2020 to solve that problem.
What’s the endgame? The startup pulls data on utility assets, property ownership, and environmental regulations into one place, helping planners decide where and how to build. Customers include governments, civil engineering firms, and utilities — among them PG&E. Mackanic wants to move beyond organising data toward recommending pipe locations and filing the permits automatically.
What led up to it? The US sees roughly 200,000 utility strikes each year, when construction damages buried infrastructure. Water and sewage pipes often belong to different organisations, with records scattered across companies and agencies. A PG&E case study found $60 million in avoidable paving costs across 1,600 planned gas distribution projects using CivilGrid.
Who’s backing it? Energy Impact Partners counts utility companies among its limited partners, which Mackanic sees as a sign the industry values the approach. PG&E executive Christine Cowsert said the company’s growing energy needs require “smarter infrastructure planning” and tools that identify risks earlier and reduce costs.
The signal: The round sits in the 90th percentile for Series A deals in US real estate, underscoring investor appetite for infrastructure data. As utilities face rising energy demand, tools that reveal what’s underground are moving from convenience to necessity.
Read more: upheadlines.com
Image credit: CivilGrid
