HaiLa

HaiLa Technologies Inc. is a fabless semiconductor and software company based in Montreal, Canada, established in 2019. The firm operates with a clear mission to enable the sustainable scaling of Internet of Things (IoT) deployments by developing hyper-power-efficient wireless communication solutions. The technology was originally conceptualized at Stanford University, and the company holds an exclusive license for three patents from the university.

The company was founded by Charlotte Savage, who serves as the Chief Innovation Officer. Savage, a sustainable technology advocate and a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree for 2021, was inspired to start the company after her experience in the medtech industry, where she observed that the batteries for wireless implantable sensors were significantly larger than the sensors themselves. This experience, coupled with a personal drive to make a positive environmental impact, led her to launch HaiLa out of the deep-tech incubator TandemLaunch. The company's name is a tribute to Hedy Lamarr, the actress and inventor of frequency-hopping technology.

HaiLa's core business revolves around designing and providing System-on-Chip (SoC) solutions and intellectual property (IP) that drastically reduce the power consumption of wireless radios in IoT sensors. The business model is fabless, meaning the company designs the chips but outsources the manufacturing. Its primary product is a technology based on passive backscatter. Instead of generating their own signals, HaiLa-enabled devices reflect and modify existing ambient radio frequency (RF) signals, such as Wi-Fi, to transmit data. This method consumes only a fraction of the power required by conventional Wi-Fi or Bluetooth radios, which addresses the critical issue of battery waste and maintenance in large-scale IoT networks.

The product portfolio includes the BSC2000, its first monolithic chip implementing passive backscatter over Wi-Fi, and development kits like the EVAL2000 and EVAL3000 to facilitate rapid prototyping for customers. These solutions allow for the creation of battery-free sensors that can operate on harvested energy, such as from ambient light. The company serves a broad market, including smart homes, building automation, industrial automation, consumer electronics, transportation, medical, and agricultural technology sectors. By leveraging existing Wi-Fi infrastructure, HaiLa's technology eliminates the need for proprietary gateways, a common bottleneck for IoT scalability.

Since its founding, HaiLa has secured significant funding, raising a total of $16.8 million USD through various rounds, including investments from Murata Manufacturing, Stanford University, Chrysalix Venture Capital, and grants from Sustainable Development Technology Canada and TechnoClimat Quebec. The company has achieved notable recognition, winning the Nokia Open Innovation Challenge in 2019 and being named "Startup of the Year" at the Sensors Converge conference in 2024, where founder Charlotte Savage also received the "Rising Star" award.

Keywords: passive backscatter, low-power Wi-Fi, fabless semiconductor, IoT connectivity, System-on-Chip, RF energy harvesting, battery-free sensors, sustainable IoT, wireless communications, ambient computing, smart building automation, industrial IoT, medtech connectivity, ag-tech sensors, radio frequency, backscatter communication, ultra-low power, asset tracking, wireless sensor networks, environmental technology