XPRIZE, in partnership with PG&E, a co-title sponsor, recently awarded $3.5 million to eight teams advancing the future of wildfire detection and response.

Following rigorous real-world field tests —including 10-minute autonomous suppression operations in the Alaskan wilderness — the judging panel is recognizing the following teams:

Track A: Space-Based Wildfire Detection and Intelligence ($1.05M awarded)

• 1st Place ($500,000): SIRIUS Wildfire Alliance – Demonstrated end-to-end system integration using SAR and optical data for fire characterization.

• 2nd Place ($250,000): Snuffed – Developed a transparent, probabilistic data-fusion framework for detection.

• Special Recognition ($100,000 each): MyRadar (commercial precision), DeepFire (fire-spread-alerts), and Mayday.AI (repurposing a volcanic-ash algorithm to spot smoke through clouds).

Track B: Autonomous Wildfire Response ($2.5M awarded): 

• 1st Place ($1.2 million): Anduril Industries – Provided a detection-to-suppression integrated pathway for cameras, sensors and drones via their modular Lattice platform.

• 2nd Place ($800,000): Dryad Networks – Demonstrated end-to-end autonomy using a 170-sensor persistent network and Silvaguard drones.

• 3rd Place ($500,000): AURA Foresight – Successfully demonstrated autonomous and persistent detection under the 10-minute gate.

Beyond the competition, PG&E is serving as the lead sponsor for the upcoming 12- to 15-month "Impact Phase," which focuses on translating these winning technologies into durable, deployable tools for real-world wildfire management.