Innovation

MyFO: $3.5 Million (Seed) Raised For Transforming Family Office Management

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 18, 2024

MyFO, a fast-growing platform for family offices and the wealth management professionals who service them, announced the closing of its oversubscribed $3.5 million seed funding round, led by Rhino Ventures. The platform simplifies and organizes financial lives by creating a comprehensive family office platform consolidating data, documents, and stakeholder management. The new injection of funds will scale its operations to meet growing demand, enhance its product offerings, and expand its team.

Constellation: Interview With CTO Nauman Hafiz About The Creating Marketing Technology Company

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 18, 2024

Constellation is a company that is inventing the world’s first and only creative marketing technology made for highly regulated industries. And the company’s end-to-end compliance solution features built-in verticalized engines designed to streamline the creative process for many companies with an automated solution that scales creative content and the regulatory approval process. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Constellation CTO Nauman Hafiz to learn more about the company.

Denodo: Interview With Founder & CEO Dr. Ángel Viña About The Data Virtualization Company

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 18, 2024

Denodo is the leader in data virtualization providing agile, high performance data integration, data abstraction, and real-time data services across the broadest range of enterprise, cloud, big data, and unstructured data sources at half the cost of traditional approaches. Denodo’s customers across every major industry have gained significant business agility and ROI. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Denodo founder and CEO Dr. Ángel Viña to learn more about the company.

StrongDM: Interview With CEO Tim Prendergast About The Zero Trust PAM Company

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 18, 2024

StrongDM is a leader in Zero Trust Privileged Access Management (PAM). StrongDM provides a policy-based platform that enables precise control over privileged actions and grants secure, compliant, and frustration-free access to all critical infrastructure. Pulse 2.0 interviewed StrongDM CEO Tim Prendergast to learn more about the company.

Manifest: Digital Wellness Company Raises $3.4 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Manifest is a digital wellness company building products for Gen Z, which has grown in popularity for tapping into desires for personal growth in romantic relationships, career success, financial abundance, and emotional well-being. The company has raised $3.4 million in funding from a16z Speedrun, HF0, Florida Funders, Soma Capital, Stand Together Ventures Lab, Transpose Platform, 305 Ventures, Mack Ventures, and other angel investors to give Gen Z a space to proactively tackle what's in front of them and build daily habits of self-care.

SynthBee: $20 Million (Seed) Raised For Scaling Its Computing Intelligence Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

SynthBee, a company building a scalable and reliable computing intelligence platform to amplify and accelerate human innovation, announced it has secured $20 million in seed funding to expand the company and build out the team around its proprietary computing intelligence platform. The funding was provided by Crosspoint Capital Partners.

Tako: AI Search Company Raises $5.75 Million (Seed)

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Tako, an AI search engine for visualizing and sharing the world's knowledge, announced it has raised $5.75 million in a seed funding round led by Kevin Hartz at A* and Ramtin Naimi at Abstract Ventures with participation from Stanley Druckenmiller / Kevin Warsh, Gokul Rajaram, Naval Ravikant, Stan Chudnovsky, Guillermo Rauch (Vercel), Scott Belsky (Adobe), GC Lionetti (OpenAI), George Sivulka (Hebbia), Aravind Srinivas (Perplexity), Johnny Ho (Perplexity), Kanjun Qiu (Outset Ventures), Joe Montana (Liquid2 Ventures), Chase Coleman, Diogo Monica (Haun Ventures), Nathan McCauley (Anchorage Digital), Paul Yacoubian (Copy.ai), and more.

MEDiC Life Sciences: Functional Genomics Company Raises $5 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

MEDiC Life Sciences, a leading functional genomics startup in Silicon Valley, announced a $5 million strategic investment from LG and Hanmi Pharmaceutical. This funding comes ahead of MEDiC’s planned Series-A round later this year. Previously, MEDiC raised $8 million in a Seed round led by a group of investors, including Illumina Accelerator, Top Harvest Capital, Primer Sazze, Big Basin Capital, First In Ventures, Valuence Ventures, Gradient, and Wing Venture Capital.

Brembo Buys Performance Suspension Technology Company Öhlins

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Brembo has signed an agreement with Tenneco, a portfolio company of funds managed by affiliates of Apollo Global Management, for the acquisition of a 100% stake in Öhlins Racing, the leading manufacturer of premium, high-performance suspension technology for motorcycles and cars in the Original Equipment, Motorsport, and Aftermarket segments.

Renovus Capital Partners: Fourth Private Equity Fund Closed At $875 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Renovus Capital Partners - a Philadelphia-area private equity firm - announced the closing of its fourth private equity fund Renovus Capital Partners IV Core Buyout, L.P., which was significantly oversubscribed with total capital commitments of $875 million.

Omnea: Procurement Platform Company Raises $20 Million (Series A)

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Omnea - an AI-based procurement orchestration and supplier risk management platform - announced it has raised $20 million in Series A funding to make procurement painless and give companies greater control over their spend. Accel led the funding round, with participation from existing investors First Round Capital and Point Nine, who led the previously unannounced $5 million seed round.

OroraTech: $27.3 Million (Series B) Closed To Advance Predictive AI In Wildfire Management

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

OroraTech, a leader in wildfire intelligence, announced closing its $27.3 million Series B funding round led by Korys, the European Circular Bioeconomy Fund (ECBF), and long-standing investor Bayern Kapital. This funding round will advance the next phase of OroraTech’s strategic growth, with the company further expanding key global markets and enhancing its predictive AI capabilities and orbital sensor network. Through predictive algorithm data fed by their thermal satellite network, OroraTech enables companies, organizations, and fire agencies to actively respond to the global wildfire crisis, reducing damage and saving lives.

Open Cosmos To Design And Build Platform For New Satellite To Track 10 Million Brightest Stars

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Space technology company Open Cosmos will design and build the platform of PhotSat, which is a space mission coordinated by the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia (IEEC) that involves the development and construction of Catalonia’s first-ever owned satellite dedicated to tracking the 10 million brightest stars and other astrophysical objects. This announcement was made during the celebration of the International Astronautical Congress, which is held from 14 to 18 October in Milan, Italy.

Allyx Therapeutics: $3.3 Million Grant Awarded From NIH

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Allyx Therapeutics announced that it has been awarded a $3.3 million grant from the National Institutes of Health as part of its Small Business Innovation Research Commercial Readiness Pilot program. This funding round will support further investigation of Allyx’s lead clinical asset, ALX-001, a highly-selective, first-in-class, synapse-targeted, disease-modifying oral therapy in development for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.

Amazon Investing Over $500 Million For Small Module Reactors

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is investing over $500 million in nuclear power technologies after revealing three projects from Virginia to Washington state. AWS has a significant need for clean energy as it expands services into generative AI (GenAI).

Innovation Works: Interview With President & CEO Ven Raju About The Early-Stage Investor

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

Innovation Works (IW) is one of the most active early-stage investors in the country and the most active early-stage investor in the State of Pennsylvania. So far, IW has financially supported over 761 companies that have gone on to raise $3.3 billion in follow-on funding, and IW portfolio companies have generated and retained over 20,000 jobs in the State of Pennsylvania. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Innovation Works President and CEO Ven Raju to learn more about the company.

HCAP Partners: Interview With Managing Partner Tim Bubnack About The Recognized Impact Investor

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

HCAP Partners is a diversely owned private equity firm specializing in providing mezzanine debt and private equity for underserved and lower middle market companies. Pulse 2.0 interviewed HCAP Partners managing partner Tim Bubnack to learn more about the firm.

Amex Ventures: Interview With Managing Director & Head of Business Development Ope Runsewe

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

American Express Ventures is a firm that harnesses the combined strength of American Express and startups to drive innovation and alter the trajectory of consumer commerce, enterprise and B2B services. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Amex Ventures managing director and head of business development Ope Runsewe to learn more about the firm.

Valory: Interview With CEO David Minarsch About Co-Owned AI Systems And Expanding The Olas Ecosystem

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 17, 2024

David Minarsch is known as an expert in the fields of Applied Game Theory and Multi-Agent Systems, holding a Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge. And his work includes the creation of the first multi-agent system framework with native support for distributed ledger technologies and crypto-native payments. Pulse 2.0 interviewed David Minarsch to learn more about Valory and the Olas ecosystem.

Lightmatter: Photonic Supercomputing Company Raises $400 Million (Series D) At $4.4 Billion Valuation

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Lightmatter, a leader in photonic supercomputing, announced today that it has raised a $400 million Series D. This company valuation at $4.4 billion brings the total capital raised to date to $850 million.

Seedstars And Redwood Ventures Reveal Strategic Partnership To Accelerate Innovation In Latin America

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Seedstars (a global organization dedicated to supporting startups and entrepreneurs in emerging markets) and Redwood Ventures (a leading venture capital firm in Mexico) announced a strategic partnership to foster innovation and accelerate growth in the Latin American startup ecosystem.

Avetta And Energy Worldnet Sign Partnership To Transform Operator Qualification Compliance Management

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Avetta, a leading supply chain risk management (SCRM) software provider, announced a strategic partnership with Energy Worldnet (EWN), an industry benchmark in training and compliance solutions for the energy sector.

OMNY Health Names Ivy Weng As New Commercial Officer

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

OMNY Health, a leading healthcare ecosystem known for facilitating compliant cross-industry data sharing, recently announced the first expansion of its c-suite since 2021. Ivy Weng, MD, former Group Vice President of Life Sciences at Komodo Health, will join OMNY Health as its first Chief Commercial Officer following its most significant growth milestone yet: one billion patient encounters, impacting the care outcomes of millions of patients.

20VC: Third Fund Closed At $400 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

20VC, a London-based venture capital firm run by Harry Stebbings, announced that it had raised a third fund at $400 million. Stebbings is also best known for running one of the most popular VC-focused podcasts. The $400 million third fund will be split between seed stage rounds ($125 million allocation) and Series A ($275 million allocation).

BuiltWorlds And 1871 Partnering To Better Serve The Construction Industry

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

BuiltWorlds (a member network and innovation catalyst for the buildings and infrastructure industries) partnered with 1871 (a global innovation hub based in Chicago). BuiltWorlds and 1871 have long worked parallel to one another, with BuiltWorlds focusing on tech innovation in myriad construction sectors and 1871 serving multiple industries, including construction. The two organizations also recently agreed to combine efforts to better identify and elevate innovation in the construction/building technology spaces.

Yellowbrick: Interview With Founder & CEO Neil Carson About The SQL Data Platform Company

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Yellowbrick is an SQL data platform built on Kubernetes for enterprise data warehousing, ad-hoc and streaming analytics, and AI and BI workloads. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Yellowbrick founder and CEO Neil Carson to learn more about the company.

ForceMetrics: Decision-Assist Public Safety Platform Company Raises $22 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

ForceMetrics – a leading decision-assist public safety platform that consolidates critical information for first responders and provides real-time, actionable insights, saving time, money, and lives – announced today that it has raised $22 million. The company is backed by leading institutional firms, industry leaders, and public safety advocates, such as a lead investment by Costanoa Ventures with additional support from the Hobson Lucas Family Foundation (founded by George Lucas and Mellody Hobson), Stand Together Venture Labs (previously the Charles Koch Institute), GovTech Fund, Flybridge Capital, Growth Warrior Capital, and more.

Sitecore Reveals Intelligent Digital Experience Platform To Address Enterprise Marketing Challenges

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Today Sitecore launched Sitecore Stream from the stage at the Sitecore Symposium - which is the company’s customer and partner conference. And Sitecore Stream represents the fulfillment of Sitecore’s vision for an Intelligent DXP (digital experience platform) that addresses the challenges and opportunities faced by enterprise marketing teams today. Customers are already utilizing Sitecore Stream capabilities in Sitecore’s composable DXP products to deliver digital experiences to the market.

Kollegio: Interview With CEO & Co-Founder Senan Khawaja About The College Counseling Company

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Kollegio is a college counseling ecosystem built entirely with AI and data-driven solutions for students, schools, and colleges. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Kollegio CEO and co-founder Senan Khawaja.

Oshi Health: Virtual Gastrointestinal Company Raises $60 Million (Series C)

By Amit Chowdhry ● Oct 16, 2024

Oshi Health, a virtual gastrointestinal (GI) center of excellence, announced today that it raised $60 million in Series C funding led by Oak HC/FT with participation from existing investors Bessemer Venture Partners, Flare Capital Partners, Frist Cressey Ventures, CVS Health Ventures, and Takeda Digital Ventures.