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Flip, a rapidly growing social commerce platform, announced the company will soon be relaunching its marketing platform for brands utilizing AppLovin’s AXON technology. And Flip announced it is raising $144 million in a Series C funding round, including a $50 million investment by AppLovin. This funding round was led by Streamlined Ventures with participation from previous investors Mubadala Capital and WestCap, and AppLovin as a new investor, bringing the company’s pre-money valuation to $1.05 billion.

Blackstone and Apartment Income REIT announced today that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Blackstone Real Estate Partners X will buy all outstanding common shares of AIR Communities for $39.12 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at about $10 billion, including the assumption of debt.

Windfall Bio, a leader in methane-to-value solutions, announced its $28 million Series A funding round led by Prelude Ventures with participation from Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund, Global Brain (through its Norinchukin Innovation Fund L.P.), Incite Ventures, and Positive Ventures. Existing investors, including B37 Ventures, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Mayfield, and UNTITLED (a fund backed by the Tetra Laval family), also joined the round.

AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) announced that it has agreed to buy W Capital Management, a US-based private equity firm specializing in GP-led and direct secondary investments. WCP will remain within AXA IM Prime, AXA IM’s fully integrated investment solutions provider across private markets like private equity, private debt, infrastructure, and hedge funds.

ION Clean Energy (ION) announced it has raised $45 million from Chevron New Energies (CNE), a division of Chevron U.S.A., who is leading the round, and Carbon Direct Capital. ION is a Boulder-based company that offers post-combustion point-source capture technology through its third-generation ICE-31 liquid amine system.

Sanctuary Wealth has appointed former Wells Fargo and UBS executive Michael Goldfader as its new West Coast Regional Managing Director. Goldfader brings 33 years of experience as a financial advisor and senior field leader to his role and joins a deep bench of wirehouse executives who have brought their skills and strategic relationships to Sanctuary.

Maniv, a global venture capital firm based in Tel Aviv and NYC, announced the closing of its third fund, a $140 million vehicle to invest in Seed and Series A stage startups. This brings the firm’s assets under management to nearly $320 million.

Biolinq, a healthcare technology company pioneering precision multi-analyte biosensors to improve metabolic health, announced the completion of $58 million in financing led by Alpha Wave Ventures, with participation from Niterra’s corporate venture capital fund jointly operated with Pegasus Tech Ventures and existing investors RiverVest Venture Partners, AXA IM Alts, Global Health Investment, Aphelion Capital, Senvest Management, Features Capital and Taisho Pharmaceutical.

SK Capital Partners, LP announced the final closing of SK Capital Partners VI at $2.95 billion. This fund is the latest vintage of the SK Capital's Flagship private investment strategy.

Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners, a specialist global investment manager focused exclusively on the infrastructure needed for the energy transition, announced the successful closing of Quinbrook Valley of Fire Fund with $600 million in capital commitments from leading US and European institutional investors. This Fund is a continuation of the large-scale solar+storage strategy of Quinbrook’s Low Carbon Power Fund (LCPF).

SiMa.ai, the software-centric and embedded edge machine learning system-on-chip company, announced it raised an additional $70 million of funding led by Maverick Capital, with participation from Point72 and Jericho, and existing investors Amplify Partners, Dell Technologies Capital, Lip-Bu Tan, and others.

Ivo (formerly Latch), a generative AI (GenAI) powered contract review solution, announced $4.8 million in funding to enable legal teams to improve efficiency and accuracy and drive consistent negotiating positions. This funding round was led by Uncork Capital and Fika Ventures, with additional funding from previous investors Daniel Gross, GD1, and Phase One Ventures. This brings the company’s total funding to $6.2 million.

Lirvana Labs, the creator of the Yeti Confetti Kids app, which provides an AI-powered personalized learning companion for preschool to elementary grade children, announced it had raised $5.3 million in early-stage financing led by Kapor Capital III, Transcend Capital Partners II, and Chingona Ventures.

Tradeweb Markets, a leading operator of electronic marketplaces for rates, credit, equities, and money markets, announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Institutional Cash Distributors (ICD), an institutional investment technology provider for corporate treasury organizations trading short-term investments, for $785 million, subject to customary adjustments. The purchase price is expected to be funded with cash on hand.

Grafine Partners, a private investment firm that accesses differentiated sources of alpha by investing in new firms led by experienced private equity investors, announced that it closed its inaugural strategy, Grafine Capital I, and parallel vehicles, with about $600 million in total capital commitments. This strategy exceeded a target of $500 million with commitments from a small and select group of institutional investors seeking new approaches to generating returns.

ViaLase, a clinical-stage medical technology company focused on addressing unmet needs in the conventional glaucoma treatment paradigm, announced that it has closed a Series C financing, raising about $40 million in gross proceeds. The funding was led by a new investor and supported by current investors, including Venture Investors Health Fund, Arboretum Ventures, and Falcon Vision, an ophthalmology investment platform supported by KKR.

Selux Diagnostics, a Boston-based biotechnology company whose mission is to combat superbug infections and fight antimicrobial resistance (AMR), announced they have received an additional $48 million to launch their next phase of commercialization of the Selux Next Generation Phenotyping (NGP) System within the US. RA Capital Management led this new funding round with participation from Northpond Ventures, Sands Capital, and Schooner Capital.

Private equity firm One Rock Capital Partners announced the addition of Jim Wiegmann to its team of Operating Partners. Wiegmann is involved with evaluating consumer, food and beverage investment opportunities and driving post-acquisition value creation in One Rock's portfolio companies. He joins One Rock Operating Partners Frank Orfanello, Dr. Kevin Lang, and Tony Palmer - who also focus on improving One Rock's investment activities and executing value-creation strategies in the consumer, food, and beverage industries.

SunFire (SunFireMatrix), a software and tech-enabled services platform serving the insurance distribution and health plan markets, announced that it has been acquired by funds managed by KKR. The funds managed by Stone Point Capital (the company’s previous majority owner) will remain a significant minority shareholder. The financial details of the transaction were undisclosed.

The Missouri Local Government Employees Retirement System (LAGERS) announced they have selected Scott Day as the pension fund’s next chief investment officer. Day will be assuming the role effective May 1, 2024.

Alternative asset manager Blue Owl Capital announced it has entered into a definitive purchase agreement to acquire Kuvare Insurance Services LP (KAM) for $750 million. KAM is a boutique investment management firm that provides asset management services to the insurance industry, including Kuvare UK Holdings.

Model N (a leader in revenue optimization and compliance for pharmaceutical, medtech, and innovators) announced today that it has entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Vista Equity Partners. Under the terms of the deal, Vista will acquire all the outstanding shares of Model N common stock for $30 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at about $1.25 billion.

Coalesce.io is a data transformation tool built for scale. And as the first platform to combine the speed of an intuitive graphical user interface (GUI), code flexibility, and automation efficiency for data transformations, Coalesce customers benefit from increased data engineer productivity and insights. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Coalesce CEO and co-founder Armon Petrossian to learn more about the company.

Homebase, the all-in-one HR and team management app that helps over 100,000 small businesses manage their hourly teams, announces a $60 million Series D funding round. This round—led by L Catterton Growth and supported by Emerson Collective—also includes existing Homebase investors Notable Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Cowboy Ventures, and PLUS Capital.

InsightRX enables life science and provider healthcare organizations to individualize treatment from clinical development to the point of care. Pulse 2.0 interviewed InsightRX co-founder and CEO Sirj Goswami to learn more about the company. 

Obsidian Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biotechnology company pioneering engineered cell and gene therapies, announced it has closed a significantly oversubscribed $160.5 million Series C financing with a top-tier syndicate of life science investors led by a new investor, Wellington Management. And new investors participating in the funding include Foresite Capital, Janus Henderson Investors, Novo Holdings A/S, Paradigm BioCapital, RTW Investments, funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, and Woodline Partners LP. Existing investors Atlas Venture, Blue Owl Healthcare Opportunities, Bristol Myers Squibb, Deep Track Capital, Logos Capital, RA Capital Management, TCGX, Samsara BioCapital and Surveyor Capital (a Citadel company) also joined the round.

NobleAI, a pioneer in Science-Based AI solutions for Chemical and Material Informatics, announced over $10 million in Series A extension financing. New investor Sway Ventures led the round and was joined by Dorilton Ventures. The round also included additional investments from NobleAI’s original Series A investors.

Arctos, a private investment firm that provides growth and liquidity solutions, differentiated thought partnership and value creation services to sports franchises (Arctos Sports) and alternative asset managers (Arctos Keystone), announced the final close of Arctos Sports Partners Fund II.

Sidley announced that John C. Godfrey has joined Sidley’s M&A and Private Equity practice as a partner in New York. Godfrey joins Sidley from Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP where he served as a member of that firm’s M&A and PE practices. And this follows the addition of a team of 11 lawyers from Paul, Weiss in the last ten months.