Venture Capital

Rede Partners Hires Riccardo Villa From Lazard As Head Of Strategic Capital Advisory

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 13, 2024

Rede Partners announced it appointed Riccardo Villa to the newly created Head of Strategic Capital Advisory role. Villa joins Rede with 20 years of experience from Lazard to deepen the firm's capabilities in supporting clients in building their franchises through accessing capital at the portfolio and corporate levels.

Freespace Robotics Raises Strategic Investment From U. S. Steel

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 13, 2024

Pittsburgh-based Freespace Robotics has raised a strategic investment from United States Steel. Freespace Robotics builds robotic storage and retrieval systems for warehouses worldwide. This funding will help Freespace hire and retain local talent and recruit others into the region.

Flagstone Raises £108 Million From Estancia Capital Partners

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 13, 2024

Flagstone - a leading UK-based cash deposit platform - announced a £108 million ($138 million) equity investment from Estancia Capital Partners. Estancia is a a US financial services specialist private equity firm with expertise in cash management. As part of the deal, Estancia takes a minority stake in the Flagstone business.

Inflexion: £1.75 Billion Closed For Partnership Capital Fund III

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 13, 2024

Leading European mid-market private equity firm Inflexion announced the final close of Inflexion Partnership Capital Fund III at its hard cap of £1.75 billion, making it the largest dedicated minority fund in Europe. The Partnership Capital strategy targets minority equity investments into entrepreneurial businesses led by ambitious founders and management teams looking to multiply.

Bear Robotics Raises $60 Million Strategic Investment From LG

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

LG Electronics announced a strategic investment move to expedite the advancement of its capabilities in service robotics, a key new business area. LG executed a stock purchase agreement to invest $60 million in Bear Robotics, a startup specializing in AI-driven autonomous service robots.

DBOS: Cloud-Native Operating System Company Raises $8.5 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Cloud-native operating system company DBOS announced that it has raised $8.5 million in seed funding and released its first product offering. Engine Ventures and Construct Capital led the funding round. And Sinewave and GutBrain Ventures also joined the round.

Grupago: $4.3 Million Raised To Expand Digital Microcredit Offerings For SMBs In Latin America

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Grupago - a fintech company that is pioneering digital microcredit for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) in Latin America - announced that it had secured $4.3 million in seed funding. Deciens Capital led this funding round, and Precursor Ventures, Clocktower Ventures, Twine Ventures, and other venture funds joined them. They were also joined by several super-angels across the US and Mexico, including Zac Bookman (CEO of OpenGov), Oso Trava (Cracks Fund), Pepe Shabot (CEO of ION Mexico) and Paul Sawaya (co-founder of Human Interest).

Siolta Therapeutics: $12 Million Raised To Develop Defined-Consortia Live Biotherapeutic Products

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Clinical-stage biotech company Siolta Therapeutics announced the completion of a $12 million Series C funding round. SymBiosis and Khosla Ventures co-led the round, which included all existing investors.

LactaLogics: Human Milk-Based Nutrition Company Raises Over $92 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

LactaLogics, a human milk-based nutrition pioneer, announced the successful closing of over $92 million in funding. This milestone enables the company to complete a state-of-the-art facility for producing human milk-based fortifiers and standardized donor milk.

Neuron7.ai: Strategic Investment Raised From ServiceNow Ventures

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Neuron7 - a leader in AI for service resolution intelligence—announced that partner ServiceNow has made a strategic investment in the company through its venture capital arm, ServiceNow Ventures. Neuron7 also released Resolution Intelligence on the ServiceNow Store, thus bringing value to joint customers across ITSM, CSM, and FSM workflows.

Bluwhale: $7 Million Raised To Bring AI To Blockchain

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Bluwhale is an AI-based Web3 startup that announced a $7 million seed funding round led by SBI (including Ven Capital and the SBI Decima Fund) with participation from Cardano, Momentum6, Primal Capital, NxGen, Ghaf Capital Partners, Spyre Capital, Baselayer Capital, Haseeb Qureshi (Managing Partner at Dragonfly), Charles Huang (Guitar Hero creator), Jack McCauley (Oculus founder), and the collaborative funds of Animoca (Japan), Gumi, MZ Crypto, and Sygnum Bank and Azimut Investment Management.

Serenity Kids: Shelf-Stable Baby Food Brand Company Secures $52 Million Series B

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Serenity Kids - a leading shelf-stable pouched baby food brand - announced it had closed a $52 million minority investment and partnership with Stride Consumer Partners. The growth capital from Stride will drive investment within several areas of Serenity Kids' business, especially marketing, talent, and innovation. And the funding and strategic partnership with Stride will support Serenity Kids' goal to improve the well-being of all children.

Eclipse Labs: $50 Million Series A Secured To Develop Ethereum Layer-2 With SVM

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

EclipseLabs—a company contributing to developing the first Ethereum layer-2 with the Solana Virtual Machine (SVM)—announced it has raised $50 million in Series A funding co-led by Placeholder and Hack VC, bringing its total capital to $65 million. Additional participants in the round include Polychain Capital, Delphi Digital, Maven 11, DBA, Apollo-managed funds, and Fenbushi Capital.

Tierra Biosciences: $11.4 Million Raised To Advance Cell-Free Protein Production Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Tierra Biosciences, a company that has built a platform for predictive AI-guided cell-free technology offering high-throughput on-demand custom protein synthesis, announced today that it closed an $11.4 million Series A funding round. Material Impact led this funding round with participation from new/existing investors like Prosus Ventures, In-Q-Tel (IQT), Hillspire, Freeflow Ventures, Creative Ventures, and Social Capital.

Vouch: Business Insurance Company Raises $25 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Vouch - a leading business insurance provider - announced the closing of a $25 million Series C-1 funding round led by Ribbit Capital. This insider-led round was oversubscribed and followed a year of strong business performance, including 66% year-over-year (YoY) revenue growth and favorable loss ratio outcomes. This momentum is supported by an annual premium retention rate of over 120% and improving margins across the business.

Blockus: Web3 Gaming Ecosystem Company Raises $4 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Blockus - a company that is at the intersection of blockchain technology and gaming - announced it raised $4 million in pre-seed funding. The pre-seed funding round was led by Maple VC and it included Altos Ventures and renowned angel investors like Zhuoxun Yin from Magic Eden, Michael Ma from CreatorDAO, and Bryan Pelligrino from LayerZero.

Applied Intuition: Vehicle Software Supplier Raises $250 Million At $6 Billion Valuation

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Applied Intuition - a vehicle software supplier for the automotive, trucking, construction, mining, agriculture, and other industries - announced it raised a $250 million Series E funding round at a $6 billion valuation. This funding round was led by Bilal Zuberi at Lux Capital (Series C lead investor), Elad Gil (Series D lead investor), and strategic investor Porsche Investments Management. Applied Intuition also revealed these new and existing investors Andreessen Horowitz (Series A lead investor), General Catalyst (Series B lead investor), Mary Meeker at BOND, Human Capital, Henry Kravis, Mustafa Suleyman, Ray Dalio, John Quinn, and Nico Rosberg.

Prudence: $80 Million Fund III Closed To Invest In Early-Stage Startups

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Early-stage venture firm Prudence has closed its third fund with $80 million of capital commitments. Launched in 2009, Prudence has invested in early-stage tech companies over the last 15 years. Prudence invests in many verticals, such as construction, real estate, infrastructure, and climate adaptation.

Reach Security: $20 Million Secured To Reinvent Security Operations

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 12, 2024

Reach Security—a company pioneering advanced AI for reinventing security operations—announced $20 million in funding. The Series A funding round was led by Ballistic Ventures, with participation from Artisanal Ventures and industry luminaries, including Mark McLaughlin (former CEO and President of Palo Alto Networks) and Denise Persson (CMO of Snowflake). Existing investors Webb Investment Network, Ridge Ventures, and TechOperators joined the round.

Ocient: Data Analytics Solutions Company Raises $49.4 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Ocient - a leading data analytics software solutions company - announced today that it has closed $49.4 million in funding. This funding is an extension of Ocient’s Series B financing, which was previously led by Greycroft and OCA Ventures and included new venture investors Buoyant Ventures, Levy Family Partners, Riverwalk Capital, Wolf Capital Management, and all prior significant investors. Including this funding round, Ocient has raised $119 million since being founded in 2016.

Milu Health: $4.8 Million Raised To Use AI For Driving Costs Savings In Healthcare

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Milu Health is a health tech company that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to drive healthcare cost savings for employees and employers. Today, the company announced its seed financing of $4.8 million led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Bio + Health and its launch with over a dozen employers to expand employee access to its platform.

URBAN-X By MINI Reveals Cohort 14 Of Startups Tackling Climate Issues

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

URBAN-X, the technology startup accelerator by auto company MINI, announced its fourteenth cohort of startups focused on tackling today’s pressing climate issues. These startups are addressing and redefining solutions that push net zero goals while creating more resilient communities, such as e-bike battery swapping for delivery workers, a landfill waste diversion operation, space-based solar power, and much more.

Permira Appoints Dedicated Team For Climate Transition Investments

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Global investment firm Permira has appointed a dedicated team to identify investment opportunities across the climate transition value chain. The team is being led by Kush Patel and another identified Partner joining later this year. They will be based out of New York and London, respectively, and will focus on climate transition assets (projects and platforms) and enablers (associated products, services, and technology).

PeakMetrics: Narrative Intelligence Company Raises $3 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Narrative intelligence company PeakMetrics announced it has raised $3 million in seed funding. The round was led by York IE, with follow-on investment from Argon Ventures and participation from Parameter Ventures and CEAS Investments. With this funding round, PeakMetrics has raised $5.7 million in total.

GoldenTree Asset Management: Private Credit Fund Closed At Over $1.35 Billion

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

GoldenTree Asset Management - a global asset management firm with over $53 billion in assets under management - announced the closing of its Private Credit Fund. GoldenTree’s Private Credit Fund secured over $1.35 billion in commitments, surpassing the target of $800 million to $1 billion.

Primergy Solar Signs $588 Million Project Financing And Power Purchase Agreement With Microsoft

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Primergy Solar - a leading developer, owner, and operator of utility-scale solar and storage projects - announced today it closed commitments for $588 million in debt financing for a 408 MWac Ash Creek Solar project in Hill County, Texas. And Primergy also signed a long-term power purchase agreement with Microsoft for the full capacity of the plant.

DocNow: Seed Funding Round Raised To Expand Next Generation Electronic Health Record (EHR) System

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

DocNow - a provider of Electronic Health Record (EHR) and wound care management solutions for Post-Acute Care providers - announced it has closed a Series Seed round led by Waterline Ventures. The company plans to use the funding to accelerate the development of innovative features, expansion across the Post-Acute Care space, and continued customer focus.

Efficient Computer: $16 Million Seed Funding Raised To Launch Energy-Efficient Computer Chips

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Efficient Computer recently emerged from stealth and introduced a new computer processor that is up to 100x more energy efficient than leading general-purpose CPUs today. Through a $16 million seed funding round led by Eclipse, Efficient created a transformative computer architecture and software stack that delivers unprecedented energy efficiency.

FitLab: $65 Million Strategic Financing Raised From Atlas Credit Partners

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Atlas Credit Partners - an asset management firm specializing in investing and partnering with medium-sized businesses - has announced a $65 million Strategic Financing Facility to FitLab, a multi-brand fitness company whose fully integrated platform solves the siloed nature of the industry, with about $35 million funded at closing and $30 million of remaining availability.

Glimpse: Battery Scanning Company Raises $4 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Mar 11, 2024

Glimpse - a provider of battery quality monitoring solutions for battery producers and electric mobility companies - announced its official launch and initial capital raise of $4 million. The company also announced the release of its high-throughput battery X-ray scanning service.