Why We Invested in Relay
Emissions come from the physical world, operated by deskless workers
At G2 Venture Partners, one of our focus areas is digital innovation that drives efficiency, particularly in industrial sectors. Deskless workers are the backbone of many industries (certainly including the industrial sectors) and constitute 70–80% of the global workforce¹. These are the workers responsible for operating & servicing the physical assets that generate the majority of emissions:
At G2, we estimate that 80% of global emissions can be traced back to equipment (generators, internal combustion engines, jet engines, HVAC units, etc) that is managed and serviced at least annually by a field service team.²
And, in the industrial environment, the US DOE has estimated that a well-run and serviced facility can reduce cost (including energy) an average of 8–12% versus peers.³ In the built environment, the DOE highlights that effective Operations and Maintenance (O&M) programs can have a substantial effect on energy consumption, and “by one estimate, O&M measures cost about 20x less and achieve roughly the same energy savings as energy efficiency upgrades.”⁴ The DOE’s Office of Industrial Efficiency and Decarbonization has set goals for the US installed base, challenging US industrial organizations to save between 25–50% of their energy over the next 10 years with its Better Plants initiative.
So, efficient and effective field work is essential to driving efficiency in industrial sectors, and thus reducing emissions. Acknowledging this, the G2 team has previously backed field service technology companies like UpWind and ServiceMax, as well as time series data platform OSIsoft. This commitment to efficient operations dates back to our Green Growth fund days at Kleiner Perkins.
But there is plenty more work to be done!
Deskless workers are the labor force that productivity tools left behind.
Hundreds of billions of dollars in technology investment have been raised to build a robust software ecosystem pointed at desk workers using computers. But only a small fraction of that investment sum has been pointed at deskless workers, leading to a growing productivity gap:
This is not a new observation, and we at G2 have been interested in this thesis for years. However, building digital tools for deskless industries is very challenging. These workers’ days are not spent behind screens. Deskless workers are often working with their hands, in demanding environments, where obtrusive or distracting devices jeopardize worker safety. As such, it has been difficult to find compelling software for these use cases, and today many industries still favor outdated and suboptimal tools and processes. 2-way radios remain the dominant real-time communication tool. While they minimize worker distraction, device cost and form factor usually limit radio deployments to a subset of team members — resulting in lower team communication and engagement levels. Manual paper-based processes remain prevalent because they are easy and reliable — but preclude teams from optimizing their workflows around accurate, real-time data.
So, these traditional approaches leave much room for improvement — and studies have shown that enhanced communication tools can drive substantial improvements to both productivity and safety. For instance, a Gallup survey indicates that companies with engaged and well-connected front-line workers experience 21% higher profitability,⁵ while another states that workplaces with top quartile employee engagement have 70% fewer safety incidents than those in the bottom quartile.⁶
Providing the right tools to improve communication and equip teams with the data & processes to work better is a massive opportunity to make workplaces, and the physical world, perform more smoothly and efficiently.
Relay: Transforming Front-Line Work
We are thrilled to announce our investment in Relay, a company dedicated to revolutionizing communication and productivity for deskless workers. Our decision to invest in Relay was driven by several factors that strongly align our, and Relay’s, vision:
Winning Team, Product and Approach
Relay empowers teams of deskless workers to do their best work. Relay’s product platform combines reliable, seamless verbal communication and accurate indoor/outdoor location services into a user-friendly device form factor. As such, Relay often replaces clunky and limited 2-way radios with a higher-capability product that is cost-effective enough to deploy to the whole team. This allows entire teams to communicate better and do their work more safely — enabled by things like location-based emergency alerts, language translation, unlimited device range, and targeted group communication over software-defined channels.
Relay’s mission is “making a tangible difference in the lives of those that power our world, often behind the scenes.” The team, led by CEO Chris Chuang, is extremely customer-focused and has built a platform that is celebrated for its ease of use and robust functionality. Customers consistently praise the product, describing it as “so easy to use,” “it just works,” and “such a robust platform.” They cite night-and-day improvements to team morale, well-being, and performance. This level of customer satisfaction is rare and highlights Relay’s culture and leading value proposition, which drives clear and obvious ROI for its customers.
Best-in-Class Technology
Innovation is in Relay’s DNA — the product is a result of over a decade of technical leadership in the digital communications space. Relay’s core audio communication protocol utilizes several communications standards simultaneously and seamlessly in order to perform in the toughest environments. Relay also offers an indoor location system that is remarkably quick and easy to deploy in hours, not days. The product also delivers real-time language translation between workers, summaries of daily work for managers, and customizable dashboards to track key business metrics. Relay’s track record of innovation positions the company as a leader in providing digital tools to front-line workers.
Driving Efficiency
Front-line workers impact every area of our economy, and Relay’s tools can significantly enhance their efficiency and effectiveness — driving meaningful sustainability improvements through waste reduction. Relay’s customers have built valuable applications on the Relay platform. For example, a large food services client developed a meal order and fulfillment tracking tool that dramatically improved the accuracy of capturing customer meal orders, immediately halving missed orders and significantly reducing food waste. Such opportunities for Relay to reduce waste and improve sustainability exist across all the deskless worker verticals Relay serves. By empowering workers, Relay not only boosts productivity but also enables companies to achieve more with less.
A Platform for Frontline Productivity
We believe the best ‘platforms’ don’t sell themselves as platforms — they sell themselves as products. Relay does exactly that: it is a superior walkie-talkie, and many customers buy it as such. By using Relay, though, customers can also easily adopt all of the digital tools that Relay has to offer.
Voice is the logical primary interface to serve digital capabilities to many types of front-line workers, and recent innovations in language AI have made voice more powerful than ever. Relay is poised to lead this transformation. The company’s current platform and team position it to define this category and build a truly transformative business, making a tangible impact on the workers and industries that power our world.
If you want to help build the future of the frontline, Relay is hiring! Click here to search open positions: https://relaypro.com/careers/
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
¹ https://www.bcg.com/press/15december2022-deskless-workers-looking-for-new-jobs
² https://www.wri.org/data/world-greenhouse-gas-emissions-2019
³ https://www1.eere.energy.gov/femp/pdfs/OM_5.pdf, p4
⁴ https://www.energy.gov/eere/buildings/improve-operations-maintenance
⁵ https://news.gallup.com/poll/241649/employee-engagement-rise.aspx
⁶ https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/191831/engaged-workplaces-safer-employees.aspx