Broadband traffic analytics startup Canopus Networks tops up Series A with $4.5 million to improve gaming lags

Sydney broadband network analytics firm Canopus Networks, which helps telecommunications providers deliver low-latency lag-free gaming, has raised an additional US$3 million (AU$4.5M) in its Series A to take the total value of the round to US$10.6 million (A$15.7m).

The latest round was led by US VC Konvoy Ventures, a gaming industry focused investor. Managing Partner Jackson Vaughan will join the board as an observer.

Canopus Networks, which has now raised a total of A$18.4 million and will use the new capital for new markets expansion and to develop further gaming-specific products. r. This investment closes Canopus’

Canopus Networks was founded in 2018 by CEO Prof. Vijay Sivaraman and CFO Himal Kumar to create an affordable network visibility management solution driven by artificial intelligence (AI) and programmable switch (P4) technology. It was born out of the University of New South Wales from research which pioneered the use of programmable network techniques for traffic classification and application experience measurement.

Headquartered in Sydney, the startup also has staff in Melbourne, New Zealand, USA, and the UK. The Canopus analytics platform is now operational in several networks across Asia-Pacific, the Americas, and the UK.

Sivaraman said low latency “lag-free” gaming can only be provided if internet service providers can effectively manage traffic, allowing users to have a seamless experience no matter how much bandwidth applications require.

“Gaming is a growing, but technically challenging market, which is suited to the solutions that Canopus Networks provides,” he said.

“The investment from Konvoy will allow us to support improved user experiences in the gaming space.”

The software gives telecommunications service providers complete and continuous visibility into gaming, streaming, conferencing, application usage and user experience over their fixed-line and 5G mobile networks. Sivaraman said that increased visibility means telecommunications providers can target investments to optimise their infrastructure to improve efficiency, enhance user experience, and increase returns on investments.

“This solution streamlines operations to improve customer support and retention, reduce churn costs and obtain behavioural intelligence to grow customer lifetime value,” he said.

“This creates new revenue-generating offerings for cloud gaming and enterprise applications.”

The AI-based network traffic analytics software can accurately measures the quality of experience for application streams in real-time, at Terabit speeds, agnostic to data encryption.

Konvoy’s Jackson Vaughan said they’re thrilled to be backing Canopus as it helps the gaming industry understands online data flows.

“Canopus Networks is built out of technical academic research in software-defined networking, AI and internet infrastructure, all hugely important to the gaming industry,” he said.