From floods to fires: Investing in technologies that make communities more resilient

Extreme weather events are becoming more frequent, intense, and costly. In 2024 alone, global natural disasters resulted in an estimated $368 billion in economic losses, with 60% of these losses uninsured, highlighting a substantial protection gap (Insurance Business). Looking ahead, a 2024 World Economic Forum report predicts that by 2050, climate-intensified natural disasters could lead to $12.5 trillion in economic losses worldwide (World Economic Forum).

At the same time, corporate exposure to climate risks is expected to triple by mid-century, with over $1.14 trillion in market value at risk for companies listed on major global exchanges (Axios).

However, there is also a massive opportunity on the horizon. According to a 2025 report by FIC and Bain & Company, global revenues from climate adaptation solutions are expected to grow from $1 trillion today to $4 trillion by 2050, while the investment opportunity could soar from $2 trillion to $9 trillion (GIC, 2025).

These figures highlight an investable frontier for the private sector. It is a space where impact venture capital can play a catalytic role in accelerating technologies that can save lives, protect assets, and create economic value.

The Power of Adaptation & Resilience Technologies

Cisco Foundation is answering this call through its Regenerative Future Fund and grants to nonprofits. The Foundation strategically invests in innovative technologies designed to help communities adapt, respond to, and mitigate the impacts of extreme weather events.

The Regenerative Future Fund’s approach combines patient, catalytic capital with blended finance models, creating an enabling environment for companies to scale transformative adaptation solutions, even when immediate financial returns are uncertain.

Keep reading to learn more about five startups and organizations the Foundation is supporting and how they are helping communities adapt and build resilience.

Responding to Rainstorms and Hurricanes: Real-Time Flood Monitoring with Hohonu

The 2024 Atlantic hurricane season was one of the costliest on record, causing approximately $200 billion in damages, with 20 named storms battering the United States and resulting in widespread damage (New York Post/ Fox Weather). Real-time water data at the neighborhood level is critical for life-saving decision-making. With hurricanes intensifying and moving more unpredictably, the difference of a few inches in water level can determine whether a neighborhood floods.

For example, many communities affected by storms like Hurricane Helene in 2024 lacked timely and localized water level data, leading to inadequate early-warnings, delayed responses, and increased damage.

Hohonu, which provides smart monitoring tools, fills this gap by delivering community-level visibility into changing water conditions. Their affordable flood-monitoring sensors deliver real-time, hyperlocal water level data to vulnerable coastal and inland communities, enabling swifter, more informed decisions around evacuations, infrastructure protection, and emergency response. The ability to track water levels on a block-by-block level can reduce emergency response times by up to 30% and has been shown to increase the efficacy of flood preparedness efforts by more than 40%.

With support from the Cisco Foundation Regenerative Future Fund, Hohonu is scaling rapidly and working with both government and commercial entities to bring real-time water monitoring to every community that needs it. As Kevin Mukai, Hohonu’s COO, noted, “With Cisco Foundation’s goal of building resilient and empowered communities – not to mention Cisco’s strengths in networking, IoT, and digital transformation – the fit could not be better.”

As of 2025, Hohonu has deployed more than 160 monitoring stations across 16 states, generating millions of hours of publicly available water level data. This open-access approach reinforces the importance of transparency and public engagement in resilient infrastructure and intelligent monitoring solutions. By helping communities build their own awareness and response capabilities, Hohonu’s platform strengthens local autonomy and preparedness in the face of rising weather and environmental risks. Learn more how Hohonu helps Lee County stay ahead of flooding in this video:

Predictive AI Analytics for Wildfire Management: Vibrant Planet

In 2023 and 2024, the United States experienced some of its most destructive wildfire seasons in recent memory. According to the National Interagency Fire Center, wildfires burned over 8.5 million acres nationwide in 2024 alone. In California, Los Angeles County saw multiple wildfires exacerbated by dry conditions and fuel buildup. These fires displaced thousands of residents and caused tens of billions in insured losses — much of which might have been mitigated with a $9 million investment in fuels reductions along the wild-urban interface, according to post fire analysis on the Eaton Fire conducted by Vibrant Planet.

This is exactly where Vibrant Planet’s platform comes in. It is a first-of-its-kind decision support system that enables fire districts, states, counties, federal agencies and utilities to understand current risk and ecological health, pinpoint priorities for risk mitigation treatments, then simulate the effects of different treatments (such as defensible space, hazardous fuels reduction, forest thinning or prescribed burns) and, over time, quantify ecological and economic benefits. The platform also supports cross-jurisdictional coordination of plans and spending for implementation. In Placer County, California, which has the highest number of structures at risk of wildfire in California, local authorities used Vibrant Planet to prioritize and plan 20,000 acres of wildfire risk reduction treatments across forested communities. The result was a cohesive, community-supported roadmap that not only reduced fire risk but also improved water security, biodiversity, and carbon storage, approved within 14 weeks, compared to typical multi-year planning processes. Vibrant Planet is now contracted as an annual subscription across 73 million acres in eight western states, including about 30 million acres in California alone.

Vibrant Planet’s technology reduces the time it takes to develop and approve forest management plans from years to weeks and reduces conflict in complex socioecological environments. The platform provides forecasted outcomes of different types and intensities of treatment, and models their effects on wildfire probability and intensity, which helps managers weigh and communicate tradeoffs of different plans to drive public support and funding for implementation. Through numerous partnerships, Vibrant Planet provides a comprehensive wildfire resilience solution — from house-level defensible space to wildland-urban interface hazardous fuels reductions, to watershed-scale ecosystem restoration.

Cisco Foundation’s investment has supported the expansion of these capabilities, enabling broader adoption of Vibrant Planet and accelerating the development of new features, including slope stabilization planning and ecosystem recovery support. As fire risk increases, platforms like Vibrant Planet will be essential for building long-term resilience and protecting people, infrastructure, and nature.

Autonomous Wildfire Suppression: Rain

Through Azolla Ventures — an impact-first investor supporting early-stage technology companies that can achieve large-scale impact—Cisco Foundation indirectly supports Rain, a startup transforming wildfire response through autonomous aircraft. Building on the proven Sikorsky Black Hawk helicopter and MATRIX autonomy platform,

Rain’s AI firefighting pilot enables aircraft to autonomously perceive, understand, target, and suppress emerging wildfires, reducing response times and improving safety for human responders. This blend of artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous robotics represents a cutting-edge approach to fire mitigation/management, offering communities a rapid, reliable tool to combat wildfires effectively.

The autonomous technology behind helicopters equipped with Rain is crucial in tackling fires during hazardous conditions, such as nighttime or in rugged terrain, when traditional firefighting efforts face significant barriers. This advanced capability can save valuable response time and protect firefighters by reducing their exposure to extreme risks.

Advanced Forest Management: Earth Force

Earth Force is advancing forest management through remote-controlled machinery and real-time digital monitoring. By modernizing vegetation management, Earth Force enables safer and more efficient wildfire prevention at scale. This technology not only mitigates wildfire risks but also enhances local economic resilience by creating safer, technology-driven forestry jobs.

Earth Force’s remote-controlled equipment allows for safer and more precise forest clearing, significantly reducing the danger to workers in wildfire-prone areas. This modernization addresses labor shortages in forest management and positions communities to proactively address wildfire risk more effectively.

Cisco Foundation Regenerative Future Fund supports Earth Force through an investment in Third Sphere, an early-stage fund backing AI-native founders transforming global systems through climate-aligned technologies.

Empowering Communities to Build Resiliency: Open Future Coalition

Open Future Coalition (OFC) works alongside communities to design adaptable workflows, build capacity, and foster ecosystems of practice across sectors like regenerative agriculture, watershed restoration, and Indigenous land stewardship.This work has been especially impactful in Western North Carolina, where OFC is partnering with North Carolina A&T State University and Warren Wilson College to support flood response efforts, citizen participation in scientific research, and regional biocultural mapping as part of broader post-disaster recovery and resilience strategies.

The Regional Resilience Fellowship program—launched with grant support from the Cisco Foundation—played a key role in shaping these tools through real-world use across 35+ project sites, laying the groundwork for a “living library” of community-published resources, templates, and curricula from projects across the OFC network. By strengthening a common infrastructure for local action, OFC is helping communities from Appalachia to the Amazon scale their impact and mobilize the resources they need to build resilient communities.

Building a More Resilient Future

Cisco Foundation’s Regenerative Future Fund and resiliency-related grants are integral parts of the company’s broader environmental sustainability strategy, the Plan for Possible, as well as our long-standing disaster response efforts. This starts with employee fundraising campaigns and grants to nonprofits that support communities in the immediate aftermath of a disaster. It extends to Cisco Crisis Response deployments that use our technology to support first responders, and to longer-term resilience and recovery efforts with our technology, our people, and our resources.

Learn more about how the Cisco Foundation supports resiliency on cisco.com

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