São Paulo – Brazilian company Stattus won the Zayed Sustainability Prize in the Water category on Tuesday (13), one of the award’s categories, held in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. Based in Sorocaba, São Paulo state, Stattus4 developed a system that uses artificial intelligence to detect water leaks in utility distribution systems.
Established in 2008, the Zayed Sustainability Prize is named after the founder of the UAE, Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, and annually recognizes initiatives that provide solutions to global challenges and are scalable and applicable beyond research. The award honors small and medium-sized enterprises, non-profit organizations, and high schools across six categories: Health, Food, Energy, Water, Climate Action, and Global High Schools. According to state news agency WAM, this year’s edition received 7,761 applications from 173 countries. Winners were selected following a jury evaluation.
Stattus4 was announced as one of the finalists in October, in its third year participating in the Zayed Prize. It won among the three finalists and more than 800 companies registered in the Water category alone. According to the Zayed Prize, Stattus4’s technology monitors over 5,000 kilometers of distribution networks and 22,000 potential leak points, resulting in savings of more than five billion liters of water.
The technology presented by Stattus4, which won the award, can reduce the time needed to locate a leak from an average of 180 days to just 3 days, using both equipment that can “listen” for leak points and instruments that measure water pressure. Its main clients are water distribution companies.
Stattus4 CEO and co-founder Marilia Lara received the award from the President of the UAE, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan. She told ANBA it is an “honor” to be among the winners of this prize. “Being alongside companies with such fantastic projects reinforces that what we’re doing at Stattus4 is truly innovative, relevant, and makes a difference. It validates all the effort of our team. We’re very happy with the award and energized to go further, increase our impact, reach more clients, and benefit even more people, moving ever closer to our purpose of saving the world’s water,” she said.
The company’s CTO and co-founder, Antonio Oliveira, said the award validates the company’s mission of turning field data into concrete action. “The recognition allows us to accelerate the development of a new generation of digital solutions, advance our AI models, and expand our capacity to scale impact, strengthen strategic partnerships, and contribute to smarter, more resilient, and sustainable water management on a global scale,” he said.
The winners in the other categories are from the UAE, Singapore, Switzerland, and Nepal. Among the six awarded schools are institutions from Canada, Uganda, Jordan, Turkey, the Maldives, and Thailand.
Translated by Guilherme Miranda
