Innovation

How Morgan Stanley And Crowley Are Advancing U.S. Wind Energy

By Amit Chowdhry ● Sep 8, 2023

Morgan Stanley Investment Management (MSIM) - through Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners (MSIP) and U.S. maritime, energy, and logistics solutions leader Crowley recently announced the creation of a new joint venture to advance offshore wind energy solutions for the U.S.

d-Matrix: Digital In-Memory Computing Solutions Company Raises $110 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Sep 7, 2023

d-Matrix - a leader in high-efficiency generative AI computing for data centers - recently announced it has closed $110 million in a Series-B funding round led by Temasek. The goal for this funding round is to enable d-Matrix to begin commercializing Corsair - which is the world’s first Digital-In Memory Compute (DIMC), chiplet-based inference compute platform, after the successful launches of its prior Nighthawk, Jayhawk-I, and Jayhawk II chiplets.

Quantum Physicists From Quantinuum And Chubu University Collaborating On AI And Cognition Research

By Amit Chowdhry ● Sep 6, 2023

Quantinuum (the world’s largest quantum computing company) and Chubu University in Japan recently announced a new and timely partnership, co-led by two global experts in quantum models of artificial intelligence, Professors Bob Coecke and Masanao Ozawa. As recognized leaders in their field, they will establish an interdisciplinary team to explore quantum computational linguistics and cognition aimed at building future applications in quantum artificial intelligence.

Celularity And Regeneron Enter Multi-Year Research Collaboration Services

By Amit Chowdhry ● Sep 6, 2023

Celularity - a biotechnology company developing allogeneic cell therapies and biomaterial products - recently announced a multi-year Research Collaboration Services Agreement with Regeneron Pharmaceuticals to support the research of Regeneron’s allogeneic cell therapy candidates.

Sortera Technologies: Recycling Industry Focused AI Company Secures $30.5 Million

By Annie Baker ● Sep 3, 2023

Sortera Technologies - an innovative material sorting company with a recycling platform powered by artificial intelligence, data analytics, and advanced sensors - recently announced the closing of a $30.5 million Series C funding round led by RA Capital Management-Planetary Health with participation from certain funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, the Mineral Resources Group - which is a part of Mitsubishi Corporation's Business Incubation Unit and Macquarie GIG Energy Transition Solutions (MGETS).

Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max To Drive Most Shipments, Says Analyst

By Dan Anderson ● Aug 31, 2023

The Apple iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro line of devices are expected to be announced on September 12 at an Apple Event called “Wonderlust.” According to credible analyst Ming-Chi Kuo (via MacRumors), the iPhone 15 Pro Max is expected to drive up to 40% of all early iPhone 15 sales.

Firstup: $100 Million In Annual Recurring Revenue Surpassed

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 31, 2023

Intelligent communication platform company Firstup recently announced that it has surpassed $100 million in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR), underscoring its position as a market leader. With over 18 million employees connected worldwide, Firstup is the trusted choice of over 40% of Fortune 100 companies. Industry giants, including Amazon, Dow, Ford, and Hilton, rely on Firstup to connect seamlessly with their workforce, deliver personalized communications, and gain valuable insights to enhance employee engagement.

Gocious Roadmaps Now Supports Jira Integration

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 29, 2023

Gocious is a company that understands that building product roadmaps could be challenging for product management teams. And Gocious Product Roadmap Management (PRM) software has been designed to help product managers communicate and align all stakeholders around a clear and accessible product portfolio roadmap. Gocious recently announced it created a solution that enables engineers and product managers to use their separate tools while integrating the important points of Atlassian Jira.

Pi-xcels: Digital Receipt Solutions Company Raises $1.7 Million

By Annie Baker ● Aug 29, 2023

Pi-xcels - a leader in digital receipt solutions - announced recently that it had completed its seed funding round, raising US$1.7 million. The funding round was led by Wavemaker Partners, with participation from other prominent venture capital firms such as Hustle Fund, Amand Ventures, Black Kite Capital, and strategic angel investors.

Koverly: $7.6 Milllion Seed Funding Raised And Pay In 30 Feature Launched

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 27, 2023

Koverly has raised $7.6 million in seed funding from Accomplice VC, Vinyl Capital, and One Way Ventures. And the company recently introduced the only buy now, pay later (BNPL) solution to give a 30-day extension on FX payments at no cost to the buyer or seller.

Lockheed Martin Wins Deal To Deliver 36 Small Satellites For Space Development Agency’s Communications Network

By Dan Anderson ● Aug 25, 2023

The Space Development Agency (SDA) awarded Lockheed Martin a firm-fixed-price agreement valued at approximately $816 million to build 36 Tranche 2 Transport Layer (T2TL) Beta satellites. T2TL is part of an overarching plan to advance deterrence with more resilient space architectures for beyond line-of-sight (BLOS) targeting, data transport, and advanced missile detection and tracking.

Algoma Capital: $100 Million Credit Fund Launched To Fuel Growth Of Whiskey Brands

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 24, 2023

CEO and founder Brian Rosen recently announced the launch of Algoma Capital with a $100 million credit fund, which would provide working capital to fuel business growth for whiskey brands and distilleries. With more than 40 years of industry expertise, Rosen has established a specialty lending platform to provide credit to premium distillers, brand owners, and suppliers looking to finance barrel inventory on an asset basis. The firm will deploy up to $10 million or more in each investment.

University Of Tulsa Investing $75 Million On New Cyber Institute

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 24, 2023

The University of Tulsa recently announced the formation of the new Oklahoma Cyber Innovation Institute to undertake groundbreaking cyber research and identify, test, and commercially deploy new cyber solutions. This institute will build on the university’s educational foundation in cybersecurity to address cyber workforce development issues.

AMIT Wireless And Actility Partnering To Deploy Citizens Broadband Radio Service

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 20, 2023

AMIT Wireless (the industry pioneer in Industrial IoT or IIoT gateway solutions) and Actility (a world leader in IoT connectivity solutions) announced a strategic partnership to facilitate deployment of CBRS (Citizens Broadband Radio Service) IoT use cases for backhauling LoRaWAN gateway traffic.

Bain Capital Private Equity Buying Fogo de Chão From Rhône Capital

By Annie Baker ● Aug 20, 2023

Fogo de Chão - the internationally renowned restaurant brand from Brazil - recently announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Bain Capital Private Equity to accelerate its growth and expansion. And Fogo will continue to operate under its current management team led by Chief Executive Officer Barry McGowan. And the funds affiliated with Rhône Capital (along with affiliates) have owned Fogo since taking the company private in 2018. The financial terms of the private purchase were not disclosed.

Honeywell And Recipharm Partner To Accelerate Development Of Inhalers With Near-Zero Global Warming Potential Propellant

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 18, 2023

Honeywell and global contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) Recipharm recently announced a commercial partnership that will speed the development of pressurized metered dose inhalers (pMDIs) that use Honeywell's near-zero global warming potential (GWP) propellant.

IBM Consulting Partners With Microsoft To Help Companies Accelerate Generative AI Adoption

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 18, 2023

IBM recently announced it is expanding its collaboration with Microsoft to help joint clients accelerate the deployment of generative AI and deliver a new offering that will provide clients with the expertise and technology they need to innovate their business processes and scale generative AI effectively.

BrokerTech Ventures Names Emily Schultz as Managing Director

By Annie Baker ● Aug 18, 2023

BrokerTech Ventures (BTV) - which is the industry's first broker-led convening platform and accelerator program - announced the hiring of Emily Schultz as its new Managing Director. Within this role, Schultz will be responsible for setting and executing on the strategic direction of BTV to help advance innovation within the broker technology industry.

Drizly Launches New Tool For Helping Hosts Throw Better Parties

By Dan Anderson ● Aug 18, 2023

Drizly, an Uber company, has launched its new Party Theme Generator 3000. To use the generator, hosts have to click a button to randomly "generate" a party theme and get drink recommendations for matching that theme along with several other tips.

TIFIN AMP: Sal Gagliano Appointed As CEO

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 18, 2023

TIFIN AMP - a leading artificial intelligence (AI) platform for the intelligent distribution of funds - announced it has appointed Sal Gagliano as the Chief Executive Officer. And the firm also announced the addition of Charlie Shaffer as the President and Chief Revenue Officer. Dr. Vinay Nair will continue as the Founder and Executive Chairman.

TTEC Launches New AI Readiness Assessment

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 17, 2023

TTEC Holdings - a leading global CX (customer experience) technology and services innovator for AI-enabled CX with solutions from TTEC Engage and TTEC Digital - recently announced the availability of its new AI Readiness Assessment. Designed to help enterprises determine their current ability to leverage AI capabilities, the assessment provides a clear picture of their digital CX maturity and offers a prioritized adoption roadmap.

Synopsys: Sassine Ghazi Assuming Role As President And CEO In January 2024

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 16, 2023

Synopsys recently announced that its Board of Directors has appointed Sassine Ghazi as president and Chief Executive Officer, effective on January 1, 2024. And at that time, Aart de Geus, chair and CEO, will transition into the role of Executive Chair of Synopsys' Board of Directors.

ThriveDX: Cybersecurity Apprenticeship Program Launches For Reskilling Talent And Enhancing Diversity

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 16, 2023

ThriveDX - a global leader in cybersecurity and digital skills training - continues its mission to reskill and upskill the global cybersecurity workforce by launching a Cybersecurity Apprenticeship Program to create job opportunities for diverse cyber talent at no training cost. And this program, made possible through strategic partnerships with non-profit organizations focusing on registered apprenticeships, aims to address the growing cybersecurity talent shortage while enhancing workplace diversity across the industry.

Altos Radar: $3.5 Million Raised For Developing 4D Imaging Radars

By Noah Long ● Aug 16, 2023

Altos Radar recently announced that it raised $3.5 million in a seed round of funding that will accelerate the commercialization of 4D imaging radars in driver-assisted and autonomous vehicles. The funding round - led by Hesai Technology CEO David (Yifan) Li, ZhenFund, and Monad Ventures - will be used to mass-produce and market Altos Radar's new high-performance 4D imaging RADAR Altos V1, which demonstrates revolutionary perception capabilities at a fraction of the cost of its competitors.

Intel And Synopsys Expand IP And EDA Partnership

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 16, 2023

Intel and Synopsys recently announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement to expand the companies’ long-standing IP (intellectual property) and EDA (electronic design automation) strategic partnership by developing a portfolio of IP on Intel 3 and Intel 18A for Intel’s foundry customers. And the availability of key IP on Intel advanced process nodes will create a more robust offering for new and existing Intel Foundry Services (IFS) customers.

Julie Heath Appointed To Oversee IU Innovates Hub

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 16, 2023

Julie Heath - a leader in launching innovative public-private initiatives and social impact organizations and the architect of Indiana’s first entrepreneurship ecosystem strategy - will oversee a new Indiana University initiative to support students and faculty university-wide in creating and growing startup ventures.

Radiant Security Launches AI-Powered SOC Co-Pilot

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 15, 2023

Radiant Security recently announced that it entered the market with its AI-powered SOC co-pilot. And the industry-first solution empowers security operations centers (SOCs) to harness the power of AI to boost security analyst productivity, detect more real attacks, and reduce incident remediation times.

Ford Hires Peter Stern As Integrated Services Head

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 14, 2023

Ford has named Apple veteran Peter Stern to lead the newly formed Ford Integrated Services, which will create and market valuable software-enabled customer experiences across Ford Blue, Model e and Ford Pro. Stern had previously served as vice president of Services at Apple for more than six years through January 2023 and was a driving force behind the launch of Apple’s portfolio of services, including Apple TV+, Apple News+, Apple Arcade, Apple Fitness+, MLS Season Pass and Apple One.

Roper Technologies Buying Syntellis Performance For $1.25 Billion: Details

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 12, 2023

Roper Technologies recently announced that it completed the acquisition of Syntellis Performance Solutions for a net purchase price of $1.25 billion, including a $135 million tax benefit resulting from the transaction. And the net purchase price represents approximately 15 times Syntellis’ expected 2024 EBITDA.

Aspen Neuroscience: FDA Clears New Drug Application for ANPD001, Autologous Cell Therapy For The Treatment of Parkinson’s Disease

By Amit Chowdhry ● Aug 12, 2023

Aspen Neuroscience recently announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has cleared its Investigational New Drug (IND) application, enabling the company to proceed with a clinical trial for ANPD001, which is a personalized (autologous) cell therapy to treat Parkinson’s Disease by replacing lost dopamine neurons.