By increasing the recycling rates we reduce the amount of waste that would otherwise end in landfills or get incinerated. We estimate that around 10 tonnes of waste are diverted additionally compared to traditional bins.
By increasing recycling rates, we increase the amount of material that gets a second life and reduce the need for virgin material. Recycling material rather than mining new material is far more carbon efficient. We estimate that around 20 tonnes of CO2 will be saved additionally compared to traditional bins.
Janus is the only bin that diverts liquids left in, for example, coffee cups automatically. Liquids are the key source for contamination. Reducing contamination increases recyclability of material, and thereby Janus increases recycling rates even further.
Janus is our first product – a smart waste bin, which sorts waste automatically and with higher accuracy than humans. By sorting the waste correctly at the beginning of the waste chain, we can reduce the amount of waste that would otherwise end up in general waste and then in the landfill as well as reduce contaminations. This leads to higher recycling rates, and by extension reduces our customers carbon footprint as well as their waste management costs.
Jonathan is the engine behind the team. His combination of passions for the environment and start-ups gives the team a clear perspective of the future for the company.
Through his previous successful entrepreneurial experience Jonathan provides the team leadership and innovative ideas.
He is finishing a PhD in Neuro-Symbolic AI after having completed an MSc in Mechanical Engineering at ETH and Caltech.
His previous research extends to quantum transistors, control software for autonomous flying for NASA, and neuro-symbolic AI.
Sustainable action generally requires up-front investment and time to pay dividends. The delayed gratification blocks businesses to take necessary sustainable action quickly enough. By developing products that are not only sustainable in their output but generate revenue from day one, we lower the barrier and enable businesses to take the necessary steps now.
Interested in more? Check out our founder's TEDx Talk.
We will reach 10'000 railway stations, airports and malls across the EEA by 2028. Offering smart waste solutions to companies that increase recycling rates by 50% while lowering waste management costs by over 40% - a win-win for everyone:
our customer, BENNU.AI and the environment.
We actively consider the environment in each choice we make and work towards a more circular economy. We act as environmental advocates and aim to improve the health and happiness of our society.
We involve our customers early on and value their input. By putting ourselves in their shoes, we can understand their needs, and thus deliver the best experience.
We strive for life-long learning: we push ourselves to keep an open-mind, learn new skills and acquire new knowledge, no matter your age.
Spring 2021
Jonathan conceived the idea of BENNU.AI and presented his idea at several competitions and incubators, winning BEST TECH at the University of Edinburgh Venture Builder incubator. Read more about what motivated Jonathan to found BENNU.AI and his first successes on the BLOG.
Spring 2021
Summer 2021
Summer 2021
BENNU.AI got incorporated in July 2021 and participated in the University of Edinburgh summer accerlarator. Together with two Design Engineering students from the University of Strathclyde, Jonathan developed the first prototype that served as a basis for our latest design. Read more about the first developments on the BLOG.
Autumn 2021
Autumn 2021
BENNU.Ai participated at the COP26 in Glasgow and won there at the largest start-up competition in the UK - the Scottish EDGE - an award for its work on sustainable robotics. At the same time BENNU.AI secured the CISCO Future Tech award at Converge - Scotlands premier academic start-up competition, and secured later that year a SMART Scotland award to develop its first MVP Janus. Read more about the competitions and their implications for BENNU.AI's success on the BLOG.
Spring 2022
Spring 2022
In Spring 2022, BENNU.AI employed its first employees and a redesign of the sorting mechanics started. This design not only allowed to sort several items in parallel but also drained liquids from the waste allowing for increased recycling rates. Read more about the early tech development on the BLOG.
Autumn 2022
Autumn 2022
In Autumn 2022, BENNU.AI built its first full-scale Alpha model, allowing to test all the mechanical and electical components and testing the technological viability of JANUS. This Alpha model led to us winning a runner-up Converge Net-Zero award. Check out our Alpha models and what we learned from it on the BLOG.
Spring 2023
Spring 2023
Bringing the first SMART Scotland project to an end, BENNU.AI developed and assembled its first Beta model of JANUS - our MVP you can see in the video above. This version comes equipped with additional liquid drainage options, sensors allowing the client to have a live feedback on the fill level of the bins, and a low-energy sensor to only turn on the bin when needed to reduce energy consumption. Read about JANUS' latest tech features on the BLOG.
Summer 2023
Summer 2023
Currently, BENNU.AI is working on getting JANUS ready for manufacturing, lowering manufacturing costs further and improving its robustness and AI accuracy. If you are interested in seeing our bin in action or even order bins, please get in touch with us.
Spring 2021
Spring 2021
Jonathan conceived the idea of BENNU.AI and presented his idea at several competitions and incubators, winning BEST TECH at the University of Edinburgh Venture Builder incubator. Read more about what motivated Jonathan to found BENNU.AI and his first successes on the BLOG
Summer 2021
Summer 2021
BENNU.AI got incorporated in July 2021 and participated in the University of Edinburgh summer accerlarator. Together with two Design Engineering students from the University of Strathclyde, Jonathan developed the first prototype that served as a basis for our latest design. Read more about the first developments on the BLOG.
Autumn 2021
Autumn 2021
BENNU.Ai participated at the COP26 in Glasgow and won there at the largest start-up competition in the UK - the Scottish EDGE - an award for its work on sustainable robotics. At the same time BENNU.AI secured the CISCO Future Tech award at Converge - Scotlands premier academic start-up competition, and secured later that year a SMART Scotland award to develop its first MVP Janus. Read more about the competitions and their implications for BENNU.AI's success on the BLOG.
Spring 2022
Spring 2022
In Spring 2022, BENNU.AI employed its first employees and a redesign of the sorting mechanics started. This design not only allowed to sort several items in parallel but also drained liquids from the waste allowing for increased recycling rates. Read more about the early tech development on the BLOG.
Autumn 2022
Autumn 2022
In Autumn 2022, BENNU.AI built its first full-scale Alpha model, allowing to test all the mechanical and electical components and testing the technological viability of JANUS. This Alpha model led to us winning a runner-up Converge Net-Zero award. Check out our Alpha models and what we learned from it on the BLOG.
Spring 2023
Spring 2023
Bringing the first SMART Scotland project to an end, BENNU.AI developed and assembled its first Beta model of JANUS - our MVP you can see in the video above. This version comes equipped with additional liquid drainage options, sensors allowing the client to have a live feedback on the fill level of the bins, and a low-energy sensor to only turn on the bin when needed to reduce energy consumption. Read about JANUS' latest tech features on the BLOG.
Summer 2023
Summer 2023
Currently, BENNU.AI is working on getting JANUS ready for manufacturing, lowering manufacturing costs further and improving its robustness and AI accuracy. If you are interested in seeing our bin in action or even order bins, please get in touch with us.
November 2022
BENNU.AI was successful at the Converge awards 2022 in the Net-Zero category the award comes with a £10,000 grant award.
June 2022
BENNU.AI was awarded the "Growth Award" at the ILG Awards 2022. This prize is awarded to the University of Edinburgh related business with the highest growth potential and comes with £5,000 prize money. Check out the other finalists and their fantastic impact driven businesses!
December 2021
BENNU.AI was awarded a £100,000 grant for the development of a smart waste bin by Scottish Enterprise. This award will help us to develop the mechanics, robotics and AI for a smart bin, which sorts waste automatically. (Note: This award has led to the development of JANUS.)
November 2021
BENNU.AI was selected as one of Scotland's most promising sustainable start-ups to pitch at the United Nations COP 26 in Glasgow their business for a main Scottish EDGE award. Jonathan successfully convinced the jury consisting of Alison Rose CEO of RBS, entrepreneur and philantropist Sir Tom Hunter, and Judith Cruishank MD Business Banking RBS, and was awarded £50,000.
November 2021
BENNU.AI participated over the past 6 months at Converge, Scotland's most prestigious program for academic start-ups leading up to the Converge awards. BENNU.AI was selected by CISCO for their promising technology underpinning our smart waste bins. This prize comes with a £5,000 prize and meetings with the CTO at CISCO UK.
June 2021
BENNU.AI was invited to participate at the Venture Builder Incubator organised by the Bayes Center at the University of Edinburgh. Among the cohort of 26 fantastic entrepreneurs, BENNU.AI was selected as the business with the "Best Innovation". Check out the rest of the cohort!
October 2023
Jonathan Feldstein got invited to give a TEDx talk, about what he thinks business and political leaders need to consider to have bigger progress with sustainable policies and products. His answer: short-circuiting the reward cycle for sustainable measures. Checkout his talk and the other inspiring speakers on the event page.
February 2023
Our paper "Parallel Neuro-Symbolic Integration with Concordia" has been accepted at ICML 2023 - a top-tier conference for machinelearning and AI. This is the second research paper for bennu.ai! The paper has been presented by Jonathan Feldstein and Modestas Jurčius in Hawaii past week. The paper discusses our latest framework - Concordia - which enables users to combine neural models with logical models significantly reducing the need for data. Checkout the preprint. We welcome any feedback and questions and hope that you try it out yourself on your datasets and models as the framework is entirely model agnostic.
February 2023
Jonathan Feldstein, our managing director, came back last week from Washington D.C., where he was invited to give a talk on his latest research in neuro-symbolic AI. The venue was the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Conference one of the most prestigious conferences in AI research. This is the first paper with bennu.ai on it as the affiliation of the researchers. Our goal as an AI and robotics research lab is to continue on developing ground breaking research and publish it for the wider community to learn and benefit from it. If you are interested in our research check out the paper and open-source code.
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October 2023
Jonathan Feldstein got invited to give a TEDx talk, about what he thinks business and political leaders need to consider to have bigger progress with sustainable policies and products. His answer: short-circuiting the reward cycle for sustainable measures. Checkout his talk and the other inspiring speakers on the event page.
February 2023
Our paper "Parallel Neuro-Symbolic Integration with Concordia" has been accepted at ICML 2023 - a top-tier conference for machinelearning and AI. This is the second research paper for bennu.ai! The paper has been presented by Jonathan Feldstein and Modestas Jurčius in Hawaii past week. The paper discusses our latest framework - Concordia - which enables users to combine neural models with logical models significantly reducing the need for data. Checkout the preprint. We welcome any feedback and questions and hope that you try it out yourself on your datasets and models as the framework is entirely model agnostic.
February 2023
Jonathan Feldstein, our managing director, came back last week from Washington D.C., where he was invited to give a talk on his latest research in neuro-symbolic AI. The venue was the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) Conference one of the most prestigious conferences in AI research. This is the first paper with bennu.ai on it as the affiliation of the researchers. Our goal as an AI and robotics research lab is to continue on developing ground breaking research and publish it for the wider community to learn and benefit from it. If you are interested in our research check out the paper and open-source code.
November 2022
BENNU.AI was successful at the Converge awards 2022 in the Net-Zero category the award comes with a £10,000 grant award.
June 2022
BENNU.AI was awarded the "Growth Award" at the ILG Awards 2022. This prize is awarded to the University of Edinburgh related business with the highest growth potential and comes with £5,000 prize money. Check out the other finalists and their fantastic impact driven businesses!
December 2021
BENNU.AI was awarded a £100,000 grant for the development of a smart waste bin by Scottish Enterprise. This award will help us to develop the mechanics, robotics and AI for a smart bin, which sorts waste automatically. (Note: This award has led to the development of JANUS.)
November 2021
BENNU.AI was selected as one of Scotland's most promising sustainable start-ups to pitch at the United Nations COP 26 in Glasgow their business for a main Scottish EDGE award. Jonathan successfully convinced the jury consisting of Alison Rose CEO of RBS, entrepreneur and philantropist Sir Tom Hunter, and Judith Cruishank MD Business Banking RBS, and was awarded £50,000.
November 2021
BENNU.AI participated over the past 6 months at Converge, Scotland's most prestigious program for academic start-ups leading up to the Converge awards. BENNU.AI was selected by CISCO for their promising technology underpinning our smart waste bins. This prize comes with a £5,000 prize and meetings with the CTO at CISCO UK.
June 2021
BENNU.AI was invited to participate at the Venture Builder Incubator organised by the Bayes Center at the University of Edinburgh. Among the cohort of 26 fantastic entrepreneurs, BENNU.AI was selected as the business with the "Best Innovation". Check out the rest of the cohort!
Enterprise Hub, Murchison House, 10 Maxwell Cresent, EH9 3BF, Edinburgh, Scotland
