gridscope
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Timothy Barat
Timothy Barat is the co-founder and CEO of Gridware, a San Francisco climate-tech company that builds pole-mounted sensors to detect power grid failures before they cause outages or wildfires. A former electrical lineworker from Victoria, Australia who lived through the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires, Barat moved to the United States, earned bachelor's and master's degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences from UC Berkeley, and founded Gridware in 2020 with Hall Chen and Abdulrahman Bin Omar. His Gridscope device, described as a 'Fitbit for power poles,' listens to the mechanical and electrical signals of the grid to pinpoint hazards. Gridware has raised roughly $97 million to date, including a $55 million Series B in November 2025, and its co-founders were named to Forbes' 30 Under 30 Social Impact list.
Gridware
Gridware builds pole-mounted sensors and an analytics platform that give electric utilities real-time awareness of what is physically happening on their power lines. Its Gridscope device measures mechanical, electrical, and environmental signals directly at the pole, and its Active Grid Response platform turns those signals into immediate hazard detection, precise fault localization, and faster outage response. Founded in 2020 by three UC Berkeley graduate students - including a former lineman - Gridware aims to close the 'hazard awareness delay' that leaves utilities blind to fallen limbs and damaged lines until after they spark outages or wildfires.