The investment follows Twenty’s $100M Accel-led Series B and further cements Twenty as the definitive offensive cyber company industrializing capabilities for the United States and its allies.

ARLINGTON, Va., July 20, 2026 — Twenty, America’s first VC-backed cyber warfare startup, today announced an additional $30 million investment from Khosla Ventures at a $1.2 billion valuation. The investment follows Twenty’s recently announced $100 million Series B at a $1 billion valuation led by Accel.

With this investment, Twenty has now raised $168 million from many of the world’s foremost technology and national security investors, including Khosla Ventures, Accel, Friends & Family Capital, Point72 Ventures, Caffeinated Capital, General Catalyst, and In-Q-Tel.

Founded in 2024, Twenty is industrializing offensive cyber warfare for the United States and its allies. The company builds AI-enabled, end-to-end systems for the U.S. military and Intelligence Community, giving warfighters the speed and scale required to deter and defeat adversaries in cyberspace. Twenty’s systems are designed to keep human judgment at the center, pairing advanced AI and automation with rigorous evaluation, controlled deployment, and mission alignment.

The investment follows unprecedented government demand for offensive cyber capabilities built at commercial speed. This Administration has brought renewed leadership to offensive cyber, calling for the United States to use the full suite of offensive cyber operations to disrupt adversary networks and raise the costs of aggression on those who threaten American interests.

“Our thesis here is simple. AI is reshaping the world and the US and its allies need an AI-native cyberwarfare prime capable of protecting our most critical interests. That prime is Twenty,” said Jon Chu, the Partner at Khosla Ventures who led the investment. “Every major national security domain needs a prime that can operate at the speed of AI while delivering commercial grade execution and earning mission level trust. I’ve searched for a company that fits this thesis for years, but have never found a team with the necessary depth across AI, cyber, and defense until now. Twenty brings together the talent, product velocity, customer pull, and mission relevance required to define this category.”

“Khosla’s investment is further validation that Twenty is the definitive company industrializing cyber warfare for the United States and its allies,” said Joe Lin, Co-founder and CEO of Twenty. “We are building the industrial base for American cyber power: the AI-enabled capabilities our warfighters need to disrupt threats at their origin. We are grateful to partner with Jon and the Khosla team as we continue pouring capital directly into research and engineering.”

“AI is changing cyber warfare. Now it happens faster, at greater scale, and most defense contractors are still building for the old world,” said Vinod Khosla, founder of Khosla Ventures. “The country that moves fastest on AI-native cyber warfare will have the advantage for the next decade. Joe and the Twenty team have the technical depth and operational credibility to industrialize offensive cyber capability at exactly the moment it matters most.”

Twenty will invest this capital directly into research and engineering, expanding the technical team and accelerating development of the offensive cyber capabilities America’s warfighters need to win against determined adversaries.

About Twenty

Twenty is America’s first VC-backed cyber warfare startup. Founded in 2024, Twenty is industrializing cyber warfare for the United States and its allies. The company builds AI-enabled, end-to-end systems for the U.S. military and Intelligence Community, giving warfighters the speed and scale required to impose costs on adversaries in cyberspace. Twenty’s systems are designed to keep human judgment at the center, pairing advanced AI and automation with rigorous evaluation, controlled deployment, and mission alignment.

SOURCE Twenty

SAN FRANCISCO, July 20, 2026 — Natural today announced that it has raised a $30 million Series A led by Kirsten Green at Forerunner, with continued participation from all major investors. The round was raised when the company was 193 days old and brings Natural’s total funding to more than $40 million.

The round was supported by Aarmaan Ali and Baris Akis, Founders of Human Capital; Ramtin Naimi, Founder of Abstract; Nichole Wischoff, Founder of Wischoff Ventures; Darragh Buckley, CEO of Increase; Pablo Palafox, CEO of HappyRobot; Paul Klein IV, CEO of Browserbase; Akshay Kothari, Co-founder of Notion; Henri Stern and Max Segall, CEO and COO of Privy; Pete Koomen, GP of Y Combinator; Dylan Babbs, CTO of Profound; Art Levy, CBO of Brex; Jake and Logan Paul, GPs of Antifund; and others.

Natural is building the foundational payments stack for AI agents.¹

Agents are becoming financial actors. They will hold and move money, request and accept payments, make purchases, pay invoices, charge for work, and transact across currencies, banks, networks, and payment rails. They need a financial stack built specifically for how they operate.

“Agents are going to become one of the most, if not the most, important financial actors in the global economy,” said Kahlil Lalji, CEO and Co-founder of Natural. “The question is not whether agents will move money. The question is who builds the infrastructure that makes agentic payments safe, reliable, compliant, and useful at scale. That is what we are building at Natural.”

Natural is building 13 products. Today, six hit general availability. Available now:

Wallets — FDIC-insured wallets for agents ²
Vaults — One-way accounts. Agents move money in, never out
Pay — Send money to an agent, business, or consumer
Request — Collect money from an agent, business, or consumer
Transfer — Move funds between internal and external accounts
Connect — Build platforms and marketplaces on Natural

Natural is also rolling out Voice, Accept, and Cards over the coming months. Voice will allow agents to collect PCI information, including card details, over the phone. Accept will allow companies to turn agents into merchants. Cards will allow companies to issue debit and charge cards for agents.

In Q4, the company plans to launch Charge, Credit, Direct, and Billing. Charge will support per-API-call billing on top of Natural wallets. Credit will allow companies to issue lines of credit for agents. Direct will allow agents to call specific payment rails at runtime. Billing will support success-based billing for agents.

“We made a bet on agentic payments a year ago, when no one was talking about it,” Lalji said. “We knew that we needed to own that entire stack. Natural builds and operates the primitives directly: ledgering, money movement, multi-bank settlement, multi-currency, fraud & compliance, agent identity & observability, and more.”

The company noted that it has built its banking and payments infrastructure with significant direct ownership in less than a year since founding. Natural was started by Lalji and co-founders Eric Wang and Walt Leung 342 days ago. The company now has a team of 17 and is hiring aggressively across every function.

“We are moving with an unbelievable level of intensity because the market is moving extremely quickly,” Lalji said. “The shift from human-executed payments to agent-executed payments is already underway, and Natural is building the infrastructure required to support that shift.”

About Natural
Natural (www.natural.com) is building payments infrastructure for AI agents. The company has raised more than $40 million from investors including Forerunner, Human Capital, Abstract, Bridge, Brex, Mercury, Privy, Vercel, Notion, Increase, Unit, Figure, and so many others.

¹ Natural is a financial technology company, not a bank. Wallet Account and banking services are provided by Column N.A., Member FDIC.

² Natural is a financial technology company, not an FDIC-insured depository institution. FDIC deposit insurance covers the failure of an insured depository institution. Certain conditions must be satisfied for pass-through FDIC insurance to apply. Deposits in Wallet accounts are FDIC-insured through Column N.A., Member FDIC, and Column’s Sweep Program Network Banks.

SOURCE Natural AI, Inc.

Walthour recognized among national leaders expanding access to capital, investment expertise, and long-term wealth-building opportunities

NEW YORK, July 20, 2026 — Jacob Walthour Jr., founder and CEO of Blueprint Capital Advisors, has been named a 2026 Melanin Money 100 Honoree in the Capital, Investment & Wealth Management category, recognizing his leadership in expanding access, opportunity, and participation across the financial industry.

The Melanin Money 100 recognizes builders, educators, founders, executives, creators, investors, and changemakers whose work is broadening the definition of wealth and creating pathways for others to move forward. Walthour was honored alongside nationally recognized leaders, including John Hope Bryant and Dr. Paul Judge.

The 2026 MM100 encompasses a number of industry leaders, including John Hope Bryant, Dr. Paul Judge, Ben Crump, Morgan DeBaun, George Acheampong, Carter Cofield, Dominique Broadway, Terrence J, Onyeka Odunukwe, Chris Sain, Imani Ellis of CultureCon, Detavio Samuels of REVOLT, KevOnStage, and other founders, investors, executives, and entrepreneurs.

Together, the broader honoree class reflects the intersection of business, finance, entrepreneurship, media, and culture. The inclusion of leaders such as Ellis, Samuels, and KevOnStage created additional opportunities to build relationships across industries and engage influential voices shaping contemporary conversations about ownership, access, and wealth creation.

Walthour’s work spans institutional investing, capital markets, economic development, and community impact. Through Blueprint Capital Advisors, he has advocated for a more inclusive investment ecosystem that recognizes the potential of historically overlooked firms, strengthens emerging financial talent, and connects underrepresented businesses with the capital, relationships, and institutional resources required to grow.

The recognition reflects Walthour’s continued work to:

• Expand access to institutional capital and investment opportunities
• Support underrepresented and emerging investment managers
• Develop the next generation of financial professionals and business leaders
• Connect entrepreneurs and firms with the networks that enable sustainable growth
• Advance pathways toward ownership, economic mobility, and generational wealth

Founded by wealth manager George Acheampong and CPA and tax strategist Carter Cofield, Melanin Money is one of the nation’s leading financial education platforms focused on entrepreneurship, investing, tax strategy, and generational wealth. Its educational programming, live events, digital content, and Melanin Money Podcast reach a national audience of entrepreneurs, investors, executives, and wealth builders.

Melanin Money Wealth Weekend was held July 17–18 in downtown Atlanta and convened more than 1,000 entrepreneurs, investors, executives, and business leaders for programming focused on ownership, investment, business growth, tax strategy, and long-term wealth creation.

About Blueprint Capital Advisors

Blueprint Capital Advisors is a strategic advisory and investment firm dedicated to connecting capital with opportunity across venture capital, private markets, and emerging investment platforms.

SOURCE Blueprint Capital Advisors

Legal AI has taken two forms: assistants that answer questions and complex platforms that manage workflows. Both hand unfinished work back to an overloaded team, with prompting, rework, and follow-up left to do. Meanwhile, the world has glimpsed multitasking agents that take work and return it done — in-house legal hasn’t had that moment. Built on eight years of experience deploying contract-review AI, DocJuris Workforce delivers it: purpose-built apps that complete work spanning contract review, IP research, eDiscovery, regulatory risk management, and legal operations with agents doing the work, citations backing every output, and human review deciding what ships.

“We’ve already deployed Workforce for several global enterprises. The overwhelming feedback is that it’s more flexible and complete than any other solution on the market,” said Henal Patel, CEO of DocJuris.

The new delivery model builds on DocJuris’s extensive experience implementing agentic systems. From 2023 to 2025, DocJuris earned back-to-back Value Champion awards from the Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC), the largest global network of in-house counsel, for reducing contract review time at Flex from eight days to five minutes and for saving Purolator International over $300,000 in contract management.

Built From the Ground Up for Business Teams

During implementation, DocJuris quickly deploys a blend of custom and standardized apps that securely weave through complex data and unique business needs, enabling broader use cases beyond traditional legal work, from finance to operations. In-house legal uniquely owns the risk in nearly every transaction, yet its tools are disconnected from how the rest of the business operates. Workforce reaches hundreds of enterprise ERP, legal, and productivity platforms through embedded integrations, so teams can surface revenue and cost leakage, react quickly, and complete business-critical work.

Pricing and Availability

DocJuris is available to select enterprise legal teams as a fixed fee services engagement or annual fee. It’s designed to be deployed enterprise-wide, scaling as use cases grow without user limits. DocJuris is SOC 2 Type II certified, encrypts data in transit and at rest, and never uses customer data to train its models. Request a demo and proposal at www.docjuris.com.

About DocJuris
DocJuris is a legal AI company headquartered in Houston, Texas. Visit docjuris.com.

Media Contact
DocJuris Communications
[email protected]

SOURCE DocJuris, Inc.

Round led by Norwest and Skegen Asset Management, with participation from Indus Bridge Ventures, GJNX Ventures, and Ashish Kacholia, to accelerate global expansion and indigenous aerospace and defence technologies

HYDERABAD, India, July 20, 2026 — Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group (RVAG), a Hyderabad-headquartered precision manufacturing and deep-tech company serving the global aerospace, defence and energy sectors, today announced it has raised $40 million (approximately ₹400 crore) in its latest funding round. The round was led by Norwest and Skegen Asset Management, with participation from Indus Bridge Ventures, GJNX Ventures and noted investor Ashish Kacholia.

The capital will be used to expand manufacturing capacity across the Group’s facilities in India, the UK and the USA; accelerate development of its upcoming integrated manufacturing campus at Hardware Park near Hyderabad International Airport; and strengthen its Mission Systems and Deep-Tech & Autonomous Systems businesses.

Over the past two decades, RVAG has evolved into a global manufacturing platform with more than 1,200 employees and over ten facilities across three countries. The Group manufactures precision aero-engine components and sub-assemblies for leading global OEMs, including GE Aerospace, Collins Aerospace, Honeywell and Safran, while also serving global energy companies such as Baker Hughes, Halliburton, SLB and GE. It currently has an order book exceeding ₹2,500 crore.

The Group is among the few Indian companies offering end-to-end aerospace manufacturing under one roof, spanning design, engineering, manufacturing, testing and assembly. Its capabilities include CNC machining, sheet metal fabrication, composites, electronics, gears, fasteners and NADCAP-approved special processes.

Beyond contract manufacturing, Raghu Vamsi has built strong indigenous capabilities through its Mission Systems and Deep-Tech verticals. The company develops micro turbojet engines, aircraft hydraulic pumps and missile subsystems for defence programmes, while its ARROBOT platform is advancing IC & Jet based drone technologies and  unmanned ground vehicles for India’s armed forces.

“This investment is a strong vote of confidence in what our team has built over the last two decades, a fully integrated, home-grown manufacturing platform that global aerospace, defence and energy leaders trust with mission-critical work. It allows us to scale capacity across our India, UK and USA operations; accelerate our Hardware Park campus and deepen our investments in Mission Systems and Autonomous Systems,” said Vamsi Vikas, Managing Director, Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group.

“Our growth has always been guided by the values of our founder, Late Sri G. Thrimurthulu, who built this company on reliability, integrity and empathy toward every stakeholder we serve. This round strengthens our ability to invest in our people, our technology and our talent pipeline as we prepare for the next phase of scale,” added Siva Arvinth, CEO, Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group.

“Raghu Vamsi has created a uniquely integrated manufacturing platform trusted by leading aerospace and energy OEMs for its technical depth and disciplined execution. We look forward to working with the team scales and unlocks the next phase of value creation,” said Shiv Chaudhary, Partner, Norwest.

“Raghu Vamsi’s breadth spanning precision manufacturing, mission systems and deep tech, sets it apart in India’s aerospace and defence ecosystem. We look forward to supporting the team through its next phase of growth,” said Navin Roy Vallabhneni, Skegen Asset Management.

The company has also established collaborations with premier institutions, including the IITs and IIITs, as well as research organisations such as ARCI and defence agencies, including ADA and DRDO, reinforcing its commitment to building globally competitive aerospace and defence technologies from India.

About Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group

Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group is a Hyderabad-based aerospace and defence manufacturing company with operations across India, the UK and the USA. The Group supplies precision-engineered components to leading global OEMs including GE Aerospace, Pratt & Whitney, Honeywell, Safran and Collins Aerospace, while expanding into mission systems and autonomous technologies.

SOURCE Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group (RVAG)

NEW YORK and FRESNO, Calif., July 20, 2026 — Paine Schwartz Partners (“Paine Schwartz”), the largest private equity firm dedicated to sustainable food chain investing, today announced the sale of Lyons Magnus (the “Company”), a leading manufacturer of ingredients, beverage, and healthcare nutrition solutions for the foodservice industry, to Truelink Capital (“Truelink”), a Los Angeles-based private equity firm.

Following the signing of a definitive agreement in June 2026 and the receipt of all necessary regulatory approvals, the transaction closed on July 20, 2026, with Truelink assuming full ownership of Lyons Magnus on a go-forward basis. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Founded in 1852 and headquartered in Fresno, California, Lyons Magnus is a leading manufacturer of ingredients, beverage, and nutrition solutions for the foodservice industry, specializing in syrups, sauces, concentrates for refreshers, lemonades, and other types of beverages, toppings, and specialty healthcare nutrition products. The Company operates manufacturing facilities across the United States and supplies the largest coffeehouse and quick-service restaurant chains in North America, as well as healthcare end-markets. In line with Paine Schwartz’s thesis-driven approach to the food and beverage ingredients sector, Lyons Magnus has built a differentiated platform defined by deep customer relationships, product innovation, and a reputation for reliability and service.

Paine Schwartz invested in Lyons Magnus through Paine Schwartz Food Chain Fund IV. During Paine Schwartz’s ownership, the Company has meaningfully strengthened its position as a leading provider of beverage and ingredient solutions to the foodservice industry. Paine Schwartz partnered closely with management to support the Company’s growth, including commercial expansion, innovation and R&D, strategic M&A, and investments to enhance the Company’s operating capabilities. Through the close collaboration and successful execution between Paine Schwartz and the management team, the business nearly doubled revenue to over $1 billion.

“When we partnered with Lyons Magnus, we saw a business with a remarkable heritage and significant growth potential,” said Kevin Schwartz, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Partner of Paine Schwartz. “Working alongside a talented management team, we strengthened the commercial organization, expanded the manufacturing base, and completed strategic acquisitions that broadened the Company’s capabilities and market reach, putting Lyons at an exciting inflection point for its next chapter of growth. We are thankful and extremely proud of everything the team has accomplished under Jim’s leadership.”

“Paine Schwartz has been a tremendous partner throughout this period of growth and transformation,” said Jim Davis, Chief Executive Officer of Lyons Magnus and a 40-plus year member of the Lyons Magnus team. “Their support helped us build on Lyons Magnus’ long heritage while investing in the capabilities, innovation, and scale our customers need from us. As we begin our next chapter with Truelink, our focus remains the same: continuing to help our customers grow by delivering reliable, high-quality, and innovative ingredient and beverage solutions.”

Evercore served as lead financial advisor to Paine Schwartz, with William Blair also serving as financial advisor. Morrison & Foerster served as legal counsel to Paine Schwartz and Lyons Magnus. Stifel served as financial advisor to Truelink Capital.

About Lyons Magnus
Lyons Magnus is a manufacturer of ingredients, beverage, and nutrition solutions for the foodservice industry. Founded in 1852 and headquartered in Fresno, California, the Company serves B2B customers across the coffeehouse, QSR chain, foodservice, and healthcare and nutrition end-markets, with a diverse portfolio spanning syrups, sauces, refreshers, smoothie bases, concentrates, and specialty healthcare nutrition products. For further information, please see www.lyonsmagnus.com.

About Paine Schwartz Partners
Paine Schwartz Partners is the largest private equity firm dedicated to sustainable food chain investing, with ~$6.5 billion of AUM and over 20 years of experience. The firm invests across specific segments of the food and agribusiness value chain, with a focus on two core investment themes: productivity and sustainability and health and wellness. Through its proactive, thesis-driven approach, the firm targets value-added and differentiated companies and makes primarily control buyout investments, with a smaller allocation to growth companies. For further information, please see www.paineschwartz.com.

About Truelink Capital
Truelink Capital is a private equity firm based in Los Angeles with over $4 billion of AUM. Truelink pairs deep industry experience in the industrials and business services sectors with a commitment to building partnerships that drive long-term value through an operationally focused strategy. Truelink partners with management, corporate sellers, and founders to accelerate growth through the execution of strategic initiatives and transformative add-on acquisitions. For further information, please see www.truelinkcap.com.

Contacts:
Paine Schwartz Media Contact
Andy Brimmer / Aaron Palash
Joele Frank, Wilkinson Brimmer Katcher
+1 212-355-4449

SOURCE Paine Schwartz Partners

Most of the compute in this year’s $450 billion AI infrastructure build never does useful work. RidgeScope diagnoses why in minutes, from telemetry alone: nothing to instrument

SUNNYVALE, Calif., July 20, 2026 — ApexData Inc. today announced the general availability of RidgeScope, an AI-powered diagnostic platform that reads the telemetry of a GPU training run and determines what failed, why and what to do about it. It arrives as hyperscalers spend roughly $450 billion on AI infrastructure this year.

Behind that number sits what the industry calls the MFU gap – the shortfall between compute bought and compute used. Model FLOPs utilization, the share of a GPU’s theoretical compute that actually advances the model, typically sits between 30 and 40 percent; fleet studies measure averages closer to 20 percent. More than half of every dollar spent on GPU compute is lost to slow chips, starved data pipelines, communication stalls, hardware faults and runs that finish cleanly while learning nothing.

At about $3.26 per GPU-hour, a 128-GPU H100 cluster costs roughly $10,000 a day on demand, some $3.65 million a year. At 20 percent MFU it does half the training work the same hardware would deliver at the 40 percent a well-tuned run reaches: roughly $1.8 million of that annual bill buys nothing that better engineering could not recover. Closing the gap from 20 to 40 percent doubles the productive output of the same hardware without buying a single additional GPU.

“The industry is financing GPUs as if they were fully productive assets, yet most clusters deliver less than half of what the spec sheet promises,” said Evgeny Potapov, co-founder and CEO of ApexData. “This is not only a neocloud problem. It applies to every organization that trains models. You cannot close a gap you cannot see, and today almost nobody sees it.”

A lightweight agent on each server collects more than 12,000 signals per training run: GPU behavior, interconnect traffic, job logs and scheduler records. An AI engine weighs the evidence against more than 20 known failure patterns, ruling each in or out. Every case ends in a verdict: what the data shows, what it implies and what it cannot decide, each claim tied to the measurement behind it.

“GPU waste is quiet. One slow chip drags down 127 healthy ones, a job saves its progress so often that it stops making any, another sits on expensive hardware computing nothing, and every dashboard stays green,” said Andrey Shamakhov, co-founder and CTO of ApexData. “We name the failure, show the evidence and say what it costs. And when the data cannot answer something, the verdict says so instead of guessing.”

For GPU cloud operators, RidgeScope settles the question behind every support ticket: customer code or cluster hardware.

RidgeScope recognizes Hugging Face Transformers, Megatron-LM, PyTorch Lightning and Keras/TensorFlow.
For most teams, training data is the company’s most valuable intellectual property. RidgeScope reads only system telemetry and scheduler metadata – never datasets, source code or model weights – and can run entirely inside the customer’s own network: on-premise or air-gapped, with local LLM models, per-tenant isolation, SSO/SAML, and GDPR- and PCI DSS-grade encryption.

Generally available today, RidgeScope installs in minutes on Slurm and Kubernetes and returns a first verdict within 30 minutes. A public Failure Catalog and Evidence Index list every failure mode and every signal a verdict may cite. Demonstrations run live at https://ridgescope.ai.

About ApexData

ApexData Inc. (Sunnyvale, California) builds AI-powered observability for ML training and infrastructure, drawing on two decades of DevOps and distributed-systems experience.

Media Contact:
Andrei Surkov
+14083298998
[email protected]

SOURCE ApexData Inc

DARIEN, Conn., July 20, 2026 — Aqualis Partners (“Aqualis”), a private equity secondaries firm founded in 2025 by Cari Lodge, a 25-year veteran of the secondary market, today announced that Hong Pan and Steve Talbot have joined the firm as Partners. Pan and Talbot worked alongside Lodge at CF Private Equity for more than 12 years, helping build its secondaries fund business.

“Hong and Steve are two of the most talented secondaries investors I know, and there is no one I would rather have at my side as we build Aqualis,” said Cari Lodge, Founder and Managing Partner. “Hong and Steve bring deep expertise across both LP-led and GP-led transactions, and, just as importantly, a shared investment discipline honed over many years of working together. The secondary market is at a significant inflection point, with demand for liquidity outpacing dedicated capital, and their addition gives Aqualis the depth to capture that opportunity at scale.”

Hong Pan, Partner
Pan joins Aqualis from CF Private Equity, where he was a founding member of the firm’s secondaries fund program and most recently served as a Managing Director. Over more than 12 years, he evaluated and executed secondary investments spanning LP liquidity solutions and GP-led transactions, helping invest all four of the firm’s dedicated secondary funds. He also supported investing across the firm’s broader platform, including its buyout, growth equity, venture capital, and real assets and sustainability strategies. Pan began his career in the investment banking group at Oppenheimer & Co., where he advised companies on mergers, acquisitions, and capital raising. He earned a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, graduating with Distinction.

Steve Talbot, Partner
Talbot joins Aqualis from CF Private Equity, where he helped launch the firm’s secondaries fund program as a founding member and most recently served as a Managing Director. During his more than 12 years with the firm, he evaluated and executed secondary transactions across LP liquidity solutions and GP-led deals, contributing to the deployment of all four of the firm’s dedicated secondary funds. He also supported investments across the firm’s broader platform, spanning its buyout, growth equity, venture capital, and real assets and sustainability strategies. Talbot began his career in investment banking at BB&T Capital Markets, advising companies on mergers, acquisitions, and capital markets financings. He holds a B.S. in Business and Enterprise Management from Wake Forest University.

Alongside the two new Partners, Aqualis is also highlighting the recent addition of Dylan Arpey as Director of Investor Relations and the arrival of its inaugural class of analysts.

Dylan Arpey, Director of Investor Relations
Arpey leads investor relations, capital formation, and business development for Aqualis. He joins from SV Health Investors, where he served as Director of Investor Relations for the firm’s Growth Buyout team, leading marketing and capital formation for its healthcare-focused strategy. Previously, he was Vice President of Investor Relations at Orangewood Partners, a lower-middle-market private equity firm, where he led investor relations and capital formation for the firm’s third institutional fundraise. Earlier, Arpey founded and served as Co-Managing Partner of Geyser Advisors, a boutique alternative investment placement agency, where he advised emerging and diverse alternative investment managers on new firm creation and capital formation.

Inaugural Analyst Class
Cameron Cavanna, an Investment Analyst, was previously a Private Equity Summer Analyst at StepStone Group and holds a B.A. in Government from Cornell University. Colin Costigan, an Investor Relations Analyst, supports the firm’s investor relations and capital formation efforts and holds a B.S. in Energy Engineering from Purdue University and a B.A. in Economics from Butler University. Michael Ofodile, an Investment Analyst, was previously a Software Engineer Intern at Oracle and a Data Science Research Assistant at the Yale Department of Economics and holds a B.S. in Computer Science and a B.A. in Applied Mathematics from Yale University. Zach Lipsher, an Investment Analyst, was previously a Private Equity Summer Analyst at StepStone Group and holds a B.A. in Economics from Yale University.

About Aqualis Partners
Founded in 2025 and headquartered in Darien, Connecticut, Aqualis Partners is a generalist private equity secondaries firm focused on purchasing small LP interests, primarily in the United States and Western Europe, complemented by opportunistic investments in GP-led transactions, directs, preferreds, seasoned primaries, and opportunities in other geographies. The firm combines decades of experience in the secondaries market with an entrepreneurial mindset, leveraging innovation, data analytics, and artificial intelligence to deliver creative liquidity solutions for the evolving needs of the private markets.

The name “Aqualis” derives from the Latin word meaning “of or pertaining to water.” Just as water is liquid and adapts to its environment, Aqualis aims to provide investors with innovative and reliable liquidity solutions, helping them unlock value, rebalance portfolios, manage cash flows, and enhance returns.

Aqualis is pronounced “AH-kwa-lis” (aqua like the color and lis like bliss).

For more information, please visit www.aqualispartners.com.

Media Contact:
Jason Holley
[email protected]

SOURCE Aqualis Partners

Rapid global adoption fuels fivefold valuation growth, taking total funding to $230 million as users build over 12 million applications on the platform

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. and BANGALORE, India, July 17, 2026 — Emergent, the fast-growing AI software creation platform that enables founders and business owners to build full-stack, production-ready web and mobile applications, today announced a $130 million Series C funding. The round was led by Creaegis, with MNI Ventures – Claypond Capital and Sentinel Global as co-lead investors, and participation from Khosla Ventures, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Lightspeed, and Y Combinator.

The latest round values Emergent at $1.5 billion, increasing its valuation fivefold in just four months and making it a unicorn in a year after its public launch. The milestone places Emergent among the fastest-scaling AI companies globally, driven by the rising adoption of AI-powered software creation among entrepreneurs, small businesses and non-technical builders.

Since launch, more than 12 million applications have been built on Emergent by users globally, including many entrepreneurs and small business owners with no technical background. The platform has seen particularly strong adoption across the United States and Europe, while rapidly expanding its presence in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Australia, South America and the broader Americas.

Speaking on the funding announcement, Mukund Jha, Co-founder and CEO, Emergent said, “The real impact of the AI revolution will be a complete democratization of who gets to build what software, where they get to build it, and how much it costs. It’s about making software development accessible to the people closest to the problem, regardless of their technical knowledge. With a platform like Emergent, the people who have great ideas and deep domain expertise can now build and run the software their business needs to succeed at a fraction of the cost.”

Emergent is addressing one of the biggest barriers in technology creation: access to engineering talent. While businesses increasingly need custom software to operate and scale, traditional development remains expensive, time-intensive and dependent on specialized skills. Emergent changes this by allowing users to build CRMs, ERPs, marketplaces, mobile applications, internal tools, customer-facing products and operational systems through autonomous AI agents.

“We built Emergent for the non-technical entrepreneur and the small business owner, with 70% of our users having no prior coding experience,” Jha adds. “We give these users a new path beyond generic SaaS, slow and expensive dev shops, lightweight prototype tools, or waiting for technical talent to which they may never have access.”

“Small businesses today have a historic moment to build, automate, and operate using autonomous platforms and address their disadvantages in the previous era,” said Prakash Parthasarathy, Managing Partner, Creaegis. “Emergent is enabling every entrepreneur and business to embrace this change with production-grade software and automation.”

Emergent is building a future where software development moves closer to the people who understand the problem, the business, and the market. By removing technical barriers, the company aims to enable entrepreneurs, businesses and non-technical founders to create custom software faster and bring ideas to life without traditional limitations.

Emergent is available at http://emergent.ai 

About Emergent:

Emergent is the fast-growing AI software platform that enables founders and business owners to create full-stack, production-ready applications using autonomous AI agents. Emergent’s vision is to enable ambitious people to move at the speed of their thought — to build faster, go bigger, and be unblocked from technical limitations. Launched in 2025, Emergent is backed by Creaegis, MNI Ventures – Claypond Capital, Khosla Ventures, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Lightspeed, Sentinel Global, Y Combinator, Prosus, Together, and Google’s AI Futures Fund. Its mission is to democratize who gets to build software and bring new ideas to life.

For media inquiries, please contact:
Moes Art | Naresh Bhandari, [email protected] / + 91 9844467342

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/3006563/Emergent_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Emergent