Catch the Wind secures $18.8M - Houston Business Journal:

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million in a private placemenr financing to help push more sales of its new wind sensorfor turbines. Manassas-basedx Catch the Wind, which trades on the Toronto Ventures Exchange, sold roughly 16.7 million shares at a pricer ofCanadian $1.30 apiece in what it hopes to be its last majotr equity financing before generating enough revenue from its lase wind-sensing product, Vindicator, to pay for operations. Compang officials also participated in theinvestmenrt round, along with institutional investors, bringing its totalo equity fundraising to date to nearly $35 million. , Research Capitaol Corp.
and Canaccord Capital served as placement agents for this latest fundraisinb in return for 6 percent of the gross proceedes and additionalstock options. Spun off last year from LLC, a fibee optics laser company that still shares the sameheadquarterds space, Catch the Wind has been developingf similar technology that senses when wind is helping reorient a turbine to captured that wind before it passes. Most wind turbineas can realign its blades only aftee itfeels wind, so they’re often too late to actually benefit from gusts, company officials said.
“Before, it was the horse-and-buggy approacgh to measuring wind,” said Phil Rogers, who founded Optical Air Data Systemas nearly 20 years ago with his wife before leavin g recently to serve as CEO for Catchthe Wind. “Thinl about increasing the gas mileage of your he said. “You’ve already bought your car. But if I can sell you somethinbg that doubles the gas mileage ofyour car, you would save more money.
” He estimates the Vindicator can capture 10 percenft to 30 percent more wind for turbines, whichh in turn helps generate more clean electricity and ultimatelhy revenue for their Catch the Wind recently sold its firsr unit to , a Canadian environmental monitoring equipment maker, while starting its first two-month field test with the Nebraskw Public Power District on its largest wind farm with 36 wind The local company, which said it’s also talking to federal agencies, hopes to use that trial’sw results later this summer to market to othert wind turbine manufacturers and wind farm With six full-time employees, Catch the Wind expectz to at least double that count by the end of this The company, which had $5.
5 millioh in cash and equivalents on hand as of March 31, is also consideriny whether to list itself on an American exchange later this “We aspire to that,” Rogersx said. “I just can’t say when.”