For Hari Janarthanan, the dream began as a child playing with ‘helicopter seeds’ on his family’s farm. The toy plastic planes were endless wonders to the little boy, who was determined to do something meaningful with his fascination for these ‘flying things’. And he did. Birdscale is a deep-tech start up that integrates drones, robots, satellite, and AI into seamless remote sensing solutions. They deliver real-world insights to customers ranging from individual landowners to large-scale industries with focus on sustainability and innovation. Hari, with his co-founders Vijay Anand, Venkatesh Prabhu, Suresh, and Tharini lead a young and ambitious team to ride the AI wave from Coimbatore.
“In school and in college, I was always the last bencher and outstanding student,” laughs the effervescent Hari Janarthanan. “I was curious, loved to learn, but not inclined to study. I was the first one to go to college in my family, but by my final year I decided that academics was not for me and dropped out. However, I was good at hosting events, raising funds, collaborating to bring in sponsors.” Hari had a lot of ideas, from food delivery to self-driving cars – none of which his family would finance, given his track record. His ultimate goal was to buy a drone and use it for events in and around his hometown, Coimbatore.
The one person who did believe in him was his grandfather, who agreed to finance his venture with the money he’d saved for his two-year dialysis treatment. Hari knew he would have to work twice as hard to return the money as this was crucial to his grandfather’s treatment. He bought the drone but needed more money for a computer and camera. That’s when he met his senior and to-be mentor and investor, Venkatesh Prabhu, who was just recuperating from hip surgery. He offered to invest, but the money was still not enough. Hari and his friends worked nights doing food delivery and drummed up enough to set up an office with their equipment. They dabbled in videography projects for events and ads, until their first mapping project came in. They completed it for six thousand rupees, put it in savings and continued to take on more such projects. By the end of the first year, they were able to pay back his grandfather and spend on social media for advertising.
“We made a documentary for Anna University for a customer. We got a standing ovation, and I found a good friend and partner, Vijay Anand. That year, just before COVID hit, we made ten lakhs! COVID stopped many things, but it could not stop our loans. We had no work, but we still had to pay our bank! Considering we were in the drone business where we could isolate, we identified three industries: agriculture, construction, and healthcare, which would definitely require our services even through downtime.” Birdscale’s path took a decisive turn through a Google ads enquiry, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Birdscale was formed and the team bought the domain in 2016. The logo is inspired by the figure of Garuda, and the name – from their aspiration was to scale on the wings of the bird. The tiny dot beneath is XYZ, the coordinates that signify mapping. “L&T was our first customer. We were desperate for orders and over committed to finishing the project in twelve days! For the company this was among thousands of other projects. For us, it was a make-or-break project,” remembers Hari. Young and unafraid, Birdscale asked to be paid after delivery, for a project that until then took the company’s vendors a year. The small startup proposed to survey the entire planned alignment – to identify vast land parcels between Erode and Coimbatore, so L&T could route pipelines to push Cauvery water between Erode and Coimbatore. Given the difference in sea levels, even planning would take a year. Birdscale began work. The first six days passed with the drones still on the ground due to unforeseen weather conditions. The young team was under tremendous pressure now. “On the seventh day we crashed our drone. We rented one more drone from another company, formed a group of 6-7 people, worked through the night to map and identify the routes. And finally began work on the eighth day, and we finished on the 18th day. Not the 12th day like we promised, but L&T was shocked that such a small team of people could achieve this. On that first project with L&T we made Rs.12 lakhs.” says Hari proudly.
Second COVID hit India and most vendors refused to go out and work. Again, ‘age factor’ as Hari calls it, propelled the team to take on projects outside of Tamil Nadu. Their next gig was in Odisha, which they completed in seven days. A bonus with this success came through Suresh Kumar, a civil engineer and Hari’s friend, who joined as the technical backbone of Birdscale.
By now L&T had made Birdscale an official vendor and projects were pouring in. So, they closed up videography and pivoted to construction engineering. The prominent industrialist Cibi Anand soon came on board as advisor and mentor, guiding the company through its rapid expansion phase.
Scaling to Chennai and beyond
Their Chennai office opened about the time that Vijay introduced Hari to Tharini, a software professional from Verizon. “I had no clue about the technology and was pretty reluctant to give up my job to join this group of young engineers. But I was impressed by their enthusiasm and sheer confidence. Once they explained their vision, I decided to quit and join Birdscale. Here I take care of HR and pitch for new business but like everyone else in this company I too wear different hats. Every day brings new learning for me,” says Tharini, who lives in Minnesota, USA and divides her time between the two countries.
AI at the core – Introducing Spectra AI
Birdscale is a completely AI driven company, in that drones and satellites are tools to collect and store data. In fact, by 2024 Birdscale began to face the growing challenges of handling massive volumes of remote sensing data. This led to an AI-first transformation, positioning AI at the heart of everything they do. With Vijay’s support, Birdscale subsequently onboarded Raguram, an AI engineer from NUS Singapore, to lead the development of Spectra AI. This is Birdscale’s flagship remote sensing AI agent that transforms raw imagery from drones, satellites, and robots into actionable insights.
The company is currently developing automated construction monitoring, preparing to launch precision agriculture solutions, and expanding to healthcare: three fields where there is constant demand for increased productivity and reduced carbon footprint. Demand for this is rising, which is as true for India as it is for anywhere in the world. Satisfied overseas customers include companies in the Middle East, South Asia and soon in rural America. “Our objective is to see where the customer’s pain point is and find the solution that best fits it. We are also involved in Spiritual Engineering. Where technology that will only help, not harm humanity intentionally or unintentionally. So Birdscale is committed to staying out of military activities, not working with companies that spray harmful chemicals, among others,” Hari reflects.
Flying in Coimbatore
Wherever the bird may take them, the team’s heart is in Kongunadu. Most of the founding team is from around the area and come from agricultural backgrounds. Interns are students from colleges around there. Most aspiring interns have to show a degree or two, a number of certifications and a long list of achievements to get into a fast-growing successful company. But not at Birdscale, “We choose our trainees based on their attitude,” states Hari. Tharini agrees, “Attitude is everything. You see this is a new industry – most people don’t even know what drones are capable of. So, they should have the drive, attitude, and be flexible – expect anything. What they receive is multiple learning opportunities in multiple domains. We built the company based on the principle that everyone should do everything: be it customer service, HR, drone tech, or new business development.”
How flies the bird
Hari describes how drone technology works for their customers. “We are focused on two areas: agriculture and construction, and are in the process of building an AI product for healthcare.”
Hari explains, “For our customers in agriculture, we help identify the right land, map the coordinates, collect data, analyse the findings and send in the reports along with relevant recommendations. Month by month we provide an analytical dashboard, and this actually helps yield increase. A click of a button activates ‘smart irrigation planning’, on their smartphones. From switching on the motor, controlling the water flow, using fertilizer, even the harvest – everything is controlled remotely so you don’t ever have to go to the field. For example, if you are in California and have bought a farm in Coimbatore, you can monitor everything from your place.”
Birdscale’s construction wing using drone tech, has proved to be invaluable to their B2B and B2C clients. Birdscale’s Digital PMC solutions automate progress reporting, material tracking, and theft prevention. They have reduced the turnaround time from three days to just two hours, enabling near real-time insights. The list of growing clientele has come to deeply value how Birdscale saves time, manpower, and costs while increasing accuracy. Tharini proudly says, “There’s progress every day, in every way. We save our customers time, manpower, inventory, and definitely money because our technology offers visibility and transparency.”
Wingspan of Birdscale
Birdscale is all set to open up for investments. Their foray into healthcare is yielding results and they hope to launch their product in the next couple years. “Currently our technology is mature. And we’re looking forward to taking it global and we want people to know about us and benefit from our learnings. Our company is all about merging raw with experience. I am raw; I left college and it could have proved to be a big blunder but by God’s grace I am here. On the other hand, Tharini, Vijay, Raghu are all experienced and a bit risk averse,” he grins. “‘Aalam theriyaama kaala vidradhu… but our mindset is: ‘Kaala ulla vidradhe aalam therinjikathaan!’ (It’s like sticking your leg in the water without checking the depth. But I believe the reason to stick your leg in is to check the depth!”) This is the combination that works for Birdscale,” laughs Hari.
Apart from COVID during their early years, the Birdscale team continues to face challenges. People in the remote areas are suspicious of drones. Pilots are routinely regarded with distrust, threatened with guns, and even beaten. Then there’s the volatility of nature, not to mention, the encounters with leopards, elephants, and foxes. But Birdscale learns with each lesson, scales with each challenge. The company is targeting Rs.100 crore revenue in three years through expansion in India, Southeast Asia, and beyond.
Birdscale is open to talking to investors, employing anyone with ‘attitude’; and is currently inviting aspiring farmers/ prospective drone partners to join their team. The possibilities, as they believe, are endless.
