AI energy startup Worlds snags Chevron and Petronas as backers

An AI company with energy applications is emerging from stealth mode with $10 million from backers including VC arms of Chevron and the Malaysian oil giant Petronas.

Driving the news: Worlds, a spatial AI company being spun out of the firm Hypergiant Sensory Sciences, announced the Series A funding led by Align Capital.

• The company's technology "combines deep learning and IoT inside of a 4D environment to give organizations the ability to observe their organization’s physical space and then, analyze and learn from their physical surroundings," the announcement states.

The intrigue: It's the first disclosed investment from San Francisco-based Piva, the recently launched VC firm that's a Petronas subsidiary but is structured to operate independently from the Malaysian company.

What they're saying: Piva CEO Ricardo Angel, in a new blog post, said companies like Worlds can play a "critical part" in the energy sector's future.

• "We’re seeing many corporations in verticals such as oil and gas, manufacturing and logistics, investing in hardware solutions often generating too much data without getting valuable insights," he writes, making the case that companies like Worlds can help make sense of it.

Go deeper: $250 million venture capital firm Piva targets the energy industry