Sorcerer (YC S24) raises $3.9M to launch more weather balloons

[ChrisArchitect]

Related from 9 months ago:

Launch HN: Sorcerer (YC S24) – Weather balloons that collect more data

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41291219

[artembugara]

Congrats, @tndl

You guys rock! Big fan

[khazhoux]

Congrats to the team.

I gotta say, though, these days I'm used these announcements all being "Two-month old FooBar startup announces $850M angel round at a $38B valuation"

[neonate]

https://archive.md/gTnOw

[xnx]

Good timing

"At least 10 sites have suspended or limited weather balloon launches because of the Trump administration’s cuts to the National Weather Service."

https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/weather-balloon...

[wturner]

Their agenda is to intentionally make government dysfunctional as a catalyst to privatize everything. It's working.

[mandeepj]

Google had something similar as well. I think they phased it out.

[rokobobo]

I believe theirs was to deliver internet

[selimthegrim]

Will they have a sick electronic music track as they launch?

[andrewstuart]

What happens to weather balloons do they just drop out of the sky? Do they ever hit anyone? Are they just garbage the gets left on the ground?

[Daviey]

Yes, I found one in a car park many years ago. Disposed of the balloon, but gave the radar reflector to the local school geography department.

[thrance]

Welp. Good for them I guess, too bad weather reporting was gutted and is no longer a public good.

At this rate, we'll soon see YC startups raising money to maintain roads.

[hodgesrm]

> At this rate, we'll soon see YC startups raising money to maintain roads.

That model has existed for hundreds of years. It's called a turnpike. There were hundreds of them in the US and UK. [0] Many still exist today.

[0] https://eh.net/encyclopedia/turnpikes-and-toll-roads-in-nine...

[huslage]

This is an anti-pattern. Doing the work that the government should be (and was) doing and then selling back the data to them or others when the data should be (and was) public domain is absolutely terrible for society.

No one should fund this.

[bigveech]

Just to put it in perspective: it costs $300–500 to produce a single atmospheric profile with current balloon infrastructure. The U.S. launches ~180 a day—that’s at least $54K daily. Not exactly “pennies.” :)

And the government already buys the helium, radiosondes, and ground systems from private vendors—so the money’s going to private industry anyway. It’s just inefficient.

With 50 of our systems doing 4 profiles a day (which is no where close to max scale), you get the same volume of data for way less. And on top of that, because we reach remote and oceanic areas that aren’t being measured today, the data is also more valuable!

Also, the data you’re referring to isn’t inherently public domain. It becomes public when the government buys it and redistributes it. That’s true whether they pay for the infrastructure themselves or buy the data directly from a company.

[jaccola]

By this logic anything could become government run but never transition from government run to privately run, creating a ratcheting mechanism that would eventually lead to ~everything being government run!

The pro case for privatisation (that I happen to believe in) is: you were paying for it anyway, via your tax dollars, having it private leads to competition and stronger incentives to improve/cut costs meaning it will net cost you less.

[counters]

It's not - it actually the core mechanism through which the "Weather Enterprise" works. Over 20 years, an important report from the National Academies [1] laid out how an enterprise comprised of public, private, and academic sector interests could work cooperatively to bolster the public good that is weather and climate information and services. It has always been the domain of the federal government to provide core, foundational data products (including forecasts and raw weather observations of many modalities) for both bolstering academic research as well as private sector innovation. The government's mission in the enterprise leaves plenty of room for private sector players to extend, complement, and supplement the foundational services provided by the public sector.

Sorcerer fits perfectly into the existing framework of the weather, water, and climate enterprise (WWCE). They produce complementary data and ensure that the government has access to it - even if the government must procure it (which they're happy to do - no one expects that these companies should give away all their data, gratis). But they could potentially greatly extend the core global synoptic observation system that powers conventional numerical weather prediction, especially for organizations which are more flexible and can work with broader data sources.

This is the WWCE working well. The real concern is on ensuring continuity - making sure innovative companies like Sorcerer can persist, in perpetuity if necessary (or at least the data products they collect and produce).

[1]: https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/10610/fair-weather...

[shaism]

Do you mind elaborating?

I agree that weather data should be public but I don’t see why we should restrict innovation in the private market if there is demand for it.

Also more generally, I see no issue in the government outsourcing work to a competitive private market wherever possible.

[frankdenbow]

The reality is that the government is not doing it, so the choices are to sit back and watch things crumble or have private companies work to try to fix things. I agree with you in principle that its a sad state of affairs though.

[CGMthrowaway]

Why can't private enterprise do weather?

[mcdow]

I can see why that might be frustrating. What about this problem makes it the best fit for the government to handle? Is it prone to natural monopoly? There are lots of things that the government can handle and shouldn’t. Just because the government handled something in the past isn’t a reason in-and-of-itself for it to resume handling it in the future. I’m genuinely curious as I am ignorant of the space.

[khazhoux]

Flawed premise. Weather modeling is not an essential service of a government

[msgodel]

Better to put all the PE money to work on it than borrowing at 5%.

[guywithahat]

This is exactly the kind of thing that should be done by private companies, what are you talking about? This data should be something companies compete at to get better at

[jzig]

Isn’t this the point of NOAA?

[pfych]

NOAA might not be around much longer! ... which is grim.

[pyman]

I can't access this site... it's behind a paywall

[tartoran]

We should be expecting more government services now going through YCombinator. Lots of profit to be made in the name of efficiency.