DURHAM – Inirv Labs, which makes a safety enhancing smart stove device pitched on the TV program Shark Tank, has raised $20,000 in equity, according to a regulatory filing.

The company, started by two Duke University inventors, previously had more than $175,000 pledged by 492 backers in a Kickstarter campaign in 2017. It also raised an $80,000 debt round in 2018.

It also presented at RiOT and the CED Venture conference.

Akshita Iyer (COO) and Ranjith Babu (CEO), collaborated to invent the stove monitoring and control system. Iyer came up with the idea for a safer stove device after nearly burning down her own home.

The company explains the device in this video:

As WRAL TechWire previously reported, Babu, a neurosurgeon at Duke, and Iyer, a Duke alumn, say they saw a need for improved kitchen safety and designed sensors as well as Bluetooth-enabled devices to attach to knobs on a stove. Linked to detectors for smoke, gas and heat, the knobs when triggered turn off the stove.

Duke inventors’ kitchen safety recipe: Internet of Things stove control, app raises $175K