Ein Pilotprojekt zur datengestützten Auswahl hat 100 wachstumsstarke slowenische Unternehmen identifiziert, die ihren Gesamtumsatz auf 2,1 Milliarden Euro verdoppelt haben
Liefert einen Leitfaden zur Identifizierung der zukünftigen Vorzeigeunternehmen Europas, während die EU über das ETC 2.0-Programm der European Investment Bank bis zu 80 Milliarden Euro an Investitionen zur Unternehmensvergrößerung mobilisiert
BLED, Slowenien, 2. September 2026 — Mithilfe eines neuen, datengestützten Auswahlmodells wurden einhundert wachstumsstarke Unternehmen identifiziert, die das Potenzial haben, zu „Global Champions” aufzusteigen; das Modell soll dazu beitragen, die Wettbewerbslücke Europas gegenüber den USA und China zu schließen.
Future 400 Event at Bled
Die auf dem Future 500 Forum in Bled vorgestellte Initiative Future 100 Slovenia will eine entscheidende Frage beantworten, während sie neue Investitionen in Milliardenhöhe zur Förderung von Scale-ups mobilisiert: Kann sie die vielversprechendsten Unternehmen früh genug identifizieren und sie ausreichend vernetzen, damit sie im globalen Wettbewerb bestehen können?
Slowenien ist das erste Land, in dem die Future-500-Methodik vollständig angewendet wurde, wodurch ein Pilotprojekt entstanden ist, das die Initiative letztendlich europaweit umsetzen will.
Stjepan Orešković, Gründer der Future 500 Initiative, sagte: „Europa beginnt gerade, das benötigte Kapital zu mobilisieren, aber 80 Milliarden Euro werden Europa nicht wettbewerbsfähiger machen, nur weil sie zur Verfügung stehen. Wir müssen unsere zukünftigen Spitzenunternehmen früher identifizieren und sicherstellen, dass sie das Kapital, die Märkte und das Fachwissen erhalten, um im globalen Wettbewerb bestehen zu können.
Auswählen, vernetzen, unterstützen. Das ist das Modell, das wir entwickeln wollen. Wir wollen mit jedem Unternehmen an seiner Wachstumsstrategie arbeiten und es mit den richtigen Personen und Institutionen vernetzen.”
Die Future-500-Methodik wurde von einem internationalen Forschungsteam der IEDC – Bled School of Management in Zusammenarbeit mit Forschern aus Harvard, Oxford, der Universität Edinburgh und der ESMT Berlin sowie Institutionen aus Mittel- und Osteuropa entwickelt.
Die Future 100 wurden auf dem „Future 500 Forum – Powering Europe’s Scale-Up Engine: From Selection to Acceleration” vorgestellt, das parallel zum Bled Strategic Forum stattfand.
Zu den Teilnehmern gehörten Andrej Plenković, Ministerpräsident von Kroatien; Dr Anže Logar, stellvertretender Ministerpräsident und Minister für Wirtschaft, Arbeit und Sport von Slowenien; Marta Kos EU-Kommissarin für Erweiterung, Kerstin Jorna, Generaldirektorin der DG GROW bei der European Commission; Michiel Scheffer Präsident des European Innovation Council, sowie Vertreter der European Investment Bank, European Investment Fund, EBRD, der Nasdaq und von Google DeepMind.
Die Future-500-Initiative vertritt die Ansicht, dass die Beschaffung von mehr Kapital nur die halbe Lösung ist. Europa muss seine Methoden zur Identifizierung potenzieller Gewinner verbessern und diese stärker unterstützen.
Un projet pilote de sélection fondé sur des données a pu cibler 100 entreprises slovènes à forte croissance, dont le chiffre d’affaires cumulé a doublé pour atteindre 2,1 milliards d’euros
Ce cadre permet de détecter les futurs champions européens, alors que l’UE mobilise jusqu’à 80 milliards d’euros d’investissements destinés aux jeunes entreprises en croissance via l’initiative ICTE 2.0 de la Banque européenne d’investissement
BLED, Slovénie, 1er septembre 2026 — Une centaine d’entreprises à forte croissance, susceptibles de devenir des champions mondiaux, ont été repérées grâce à un nouveau modèle de sélection fondé sur des données, conçu pour contribuer à réduire l’écart de compétitivité entre l’Europe, les États-Unis et la Chine.
Future 400 Event at Bled
Dévoilé lors du forum « Future 500 » à Bled, l’indice Future 100 Slovenia vise à répondre à une question cruciale au moment même où il s’emploie à mobiliser des milliards d’euros de nouveaux investissements au profit des jeunes entreprises en croissance : cet indice est-il capable d’identifier suffisamment tôt ses entreprises les plus prometteuses et de les faire bénéficier d’un réseau assez solide pour assurer leur compétitivité à l’échelle mondiale ?
La Slovénie est le premier pays dans lequel la méthode « Future 500 » a été pleinement mise en œuvre pour donner naissance à un projet pilote que l’initiative prévoit à terme de déployer dans toute l’Europe.
Stjepan Orešković, fondateur de l’initiative « Future 500 », déclare : « L’Europe commence à mobiliser les capitaux dont elle a besoin, mais 80 milliards d’euros disponibles ne suffiront pas à rendre l’Europe plus compétitive. Nous devons repérer plus tôt nos futurs champions et veiller à ce qu’ils disposent des capitaux, des débouchés commerciaux et des compétences nécessaires pour pouvoir rivaliser avec leurs concurrents mondiaux.
Sélectionner, relier, soutenir. Tel est le modèle que nous souhaitons développer. Nous souhaitons accompagner chaque entreprise dans sa stratégie de croissance et la mettre en relation avec les personnes et les institutions qui l’aideront à prospérer. »
La méthode « Future 500 » a été mise au point par une équipe de recherche internationale de l’IEDC – Bled School of Management, en collaboration avec des chercheurs de Harvard, d’Oxford, de l’université d’Édimbourg et de l’École européenne de management et de technologie (ESMT) de Berlin, ainsi que d’autres établissements d’Europe centrale et orientale.
L’indice « Future 100 » a été dévoilé lors du forum « Future 500 », intitulé « Propulser les jeunes entreprises européennes en croissance : de la sélection à l’accélération », organisé en marge du Forum stratégique de Bled.
Parmi les participants figuraient Andrej Plenković, Premier ministre de la Croatie ; Anž Logar, vice-Premier ministre et ministre de l’économie, du travail et des sports de la Slovénie ; Marta Kos, commissaire européenne chargée de l’élargissement ; Kerstin Jorna, directrice générale du marché intérieur, de l’industrie, de l’entrepreneuriat et des PME (DG GROW) de la Commission européenne ; Michiel Scheffer, président du Conseil européen de l’innovation ; ainsi que des représentants de la Banque européenne d’investissement, du Fonds européen d’investissement, de la Banque européenne pour la reconstruction et le développement (BERD), du Nasdaq et de Google DeepMind.
L’initiative « Future 500 » soutient que lever davantage de capitaux ne constitue qu’une partie de la solution. L’Europe doit améliorer la manière dont elle repère et soutient les acteurs prometteurs.
Founded by former Head of Product at Plaid, Light is expanding beyond Texas as businesses increasingly embed electricity into their products and services
AUSTIN, Texas, Sept. 1, 2026 — Light, the power company enabling embedded electricity products for businesses, today announced $46 million in Series A funding led by Matrix and joined by Activate Capital and existing investors including Spark Capital, Mischief, Gigascale Capital, MCJ and BoxGroup. The round brings Light’s total funding to approximately $60 million, with the company’s capital base exceeding $100 million, including its credit facility, as it scales its rapidly growing partner ecosystem.
U.S. power demand is hitting record highs, AI infrastructure growth is accelerating, and residential electricity prices have climbed nearly 40% in five years. As energy moves to the center of household and enterprise budgets, owning the electricity relationship has become essential to driving core product sales, deepening customer engagement, and unlocking new revenue for expansive categories of companies.
Yet, becoming an electricity provider requires navigating state-by-state licensing, wholesale power procurement, commodity risk management, billing, customer support and grid integration – a process that can take years. Meanwhile, working with standalone electricity providers limits companies to referring customers to one-size-fits-all electricity plans.
Light was founded to unleash innovation in power. Through its API platform, companies can launch embedded electricity plans tailored to their customers and integrated into their existing offerings in as little as two weeks. As the regulated electricity provider, Light manages the energy stack behind the scenes – from compliance and customer support to Virtual Power Plant operations – so partners can offer electricity without building from scratch. Light already supports partners across:
Real estate and proptech: embedding electricity plans directly into resident onboarding to streamline move-ins and generate revenue
Battery and solar: combining behind-the-meter systems, grid electricity service and VPP benefits in one place to simplify sales and eliminate customer confusion
Mobility: offering subscription EV charging plans that make energy costs predictable and help sell more EVs and chargers
Fintech: lowering customers’ electricity bills to deliver savings and increase engagement
“Every decade has produced a new infrastructure layer that changed how companies build products and serve customers, from software to embedded financial services. Electricity is the next frontier,” said Baker Shogry, co-founder and CEO of Light. “Light removes the barriers, enabling any company to offer tailored electricity services as seamlessly as they offer payments, financing or other products today.”
“At Plaid, Baker saw how the right infrastructure layer can create entirely new categories of companies and products,” said Matt Brown, Partner at Matrix. “Energy has reached a similar inflection point. The underlying infrastructure and operations have been too complex for enterprises to build themselves, so Baker, Adam and the team built Light to make embedded electricity possible.”
Alongside the financing, Light continues expanding its platform and geographic reach, including:
Membership with PJM, the nation’s largest wholesale electricity market, paving the way for expansion beyond Texas, beginning in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Illinois
A broadened battery offering, enabling partners to bundle home battery systems with electricity plans that provide backup power and support a more resilient grid
Its first EV-centric product, allowing partners to offer subscription charging plans alongside solar buyback and traditional electricity plans on one platform
Today, Light’s partner network reaches more than 30% of all U.S. residential solar sales, over 500,000 homeowners, and more than 1 million multi-family units, with partners including Palmetto, GoodLeap, Emporia, Public Grid, Lunar Energy, and Moved. In the first half of 2026, 100% of new electricity brands entering the Texas market launched on Light’s platform, up from over 70% in 2025, while Light increased run-rate revenue 10x over 12 months.
Headquartered in Austin, Light has grown to over 35 employees and expects to more than double its headcount over the next 12 months while investing in product innovation and geographic expansion.
About Light Light is a power company enabling businesses to offer branded electricity products through a modern API platform. As the regulated electricity provider, Light manages the complexity of providing electricity – including licensing, wholesale procurement, billing, customer support, and VPP participation – allowing businesses to embed customized electricity offerings directly into their products and services.
MONTREAL, Sept. 1, 2026 — Scopia Surgical, a Montreal-based TechMed company developing real-time AI-powered surgical navigation for minimally invasive and robotic surgery, announced the closing of its oversubscribed $2.65M CAD pre-seed financing round. The financing was co-led by Linearis Ventures and Anges Québec with participation from Fonds Impulsion, an initiative of the Government of Quebec managed by Investissement Québec, HaloHealth, Richard Rubin, Suresh Madan, and other investors.
“This round, backed by investors who have built and scaled life sciences companies, gives us the resources and expert advisory needed to bring our vision into the first clinical evaluations”, said Gabriel Rivest, CEO and co-founder.
“The momentum behind this oversubscribed financing reflects our confidence in Scopia’s vision and its ability to unlock the transformative potential of physical AI within one of healthcare’s fastest-growing markets. We believe Scopia could become a category-defining company”, according to Manon Boisclair, Managing Partner, Linearis Ventures.
The proceeds will be used to grow the engineering and clinical teams, accelerate product development, and advance the first clinical validation of Scopia Surgical Navigation across several hospitals in Canada and the United States. “Our goal is to bring the full richness of preoperative imaging into the operating room, in real time on the systems hospitals already own to reduce complications and optimize surgical outcomes”, Rivest added.
In addition, the company is now focused on preparing for the regulatory and commercialization milestones. “Scopia Surgical captured the attention of the Angels through its potential to optimize surgeons’ practice with an innovative solution compatible with current operating room equipment. We are extremely proud to support these forward-thinking entrepreneurs”, said Hélène Moore, Anges Québec Representative.
About Scopia Surgical Scopia Surgical is building a physical AI software platform for robotic surgery. By fusing real-time spatial intelligence with patient-specific digital twins, Scopia Surgical bridges the gap between human intervention and robotic execution. The technology, based on computer vision, enables existing systems to achieve unprecedented precision, transforming the operating room into a high-fidelity, autonomous-ready environment. For more information, visit www.scopia.tech
About Linearis Ventures Linearis, with its tandem Ventures Fund and Laboratory, is pioneering and supporting discoveries to prevent, detect, and cure diseases through direct investments in innovative AI-powered life sciences companies. To learn more about Linearis Ventures, visit www.linearis.com
About Anges Québec Anges Québec is Canada’s largest angel investor network, bringing together serial technology entrepreneurs, seasoned investors and industry experts, with more than $200M CAD invested since 2008, and over 115 active companies in the portfolio. For more information, visit www.angesquebec.com
The company is expanding its team to meet surging demand from leading inference companies and data centers, and to bring its AI-native multicluster operating system to every team running GPUs at scale.
SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 1, 2026 — Some of the most demanding infrastructure in AI can now be run by remarkably few people. For one of Aranya‘s customers, a leading AI inference provider, it’s now possible to operate their entire GPU fleet with only a handful of engineers—a direct result of Aranya’s technology. Before its first anniversary, Aranya is actively managing more than $500M worth of GPUs. Today, the company announces $11M in funding, including a $9M seed round led by First Round Capital with participation from Box Group, Vermilion Cliffs, and Asylum Ventures and a $2M pre-seed round led by Asylum Ventures, with participation from Founder Collective, Parable VC, and Uncommon Ventures. This raise reflects the urgency of Aranya’s mission to bridge the gap between what data centers offer and what AI workloads really need.
Inference is now the critical mass workload of the AI era, accounting for two-thirds of all compute by the end of 2026—a 2x increase in only three years. Compute infrastructure was never built for this shift, and both large-scale AI enterprises and datacenter supply are struggling to keep pace. Aranya closes that gap, converting bare metal into custom, production-ready clusters in under 48 hours for fast-growing inference providers, AI startups, and data centers. Their bleeding-edge technology forms the connective tissue between AI companies and the highly distributed GPU hardware that fuels them.
ClusterdOS, Aranya’s open-source engine built on top of Kubernetes, turns any quantity of raw bare metal servers into a self-healing, enterprise-grade, cohesive whole—completely customized. Its proprietary technology, the AI-native multicluster operating system, feels the pulse of every cluster, reasoning through the issues and acting decisively before any team member needs to be alerted. The result is direct, plain-language control over how inference or training is designed, scaled, and operated, cutting the overhead and complexity of HPC clusters.
“In less than a year, Aranya is already managing hundreds of millions of dollars in GPUs for some of the most demanding inference workloads in AI,” said Todd Jackson, Partner at First Round Capital. “The team built exactly what the infrastructure layer needs: something that makes the complexity disappear.”
The Growing Gap Between Raw Compute and Production-Ready Infrastructure Today, deploying AI at scale means stomaching exorbitant hyperscale GPU pricing, wrangling highly custom architecture, or effectively building a cloud from scratch on bare metal. Even with a dedicated platform engineering team, most organizations struggle deeply to ship to production on a competitive timeline.
Aranya closes every one of these gaps. Any team, regardless of technical background, can now seamlessly design, scale, and operate enormous compute clusters. Their technology is already trusted to operate more than $500M of compute hardware for some of the world’s preeminent AI companies. In a case study with Hydra Host, Aranya cut cluster setup timelines from six weeks to less than 48 hours, and once deployed, their distributed operating system reduced outages by 90%.
“A growing number of customers need more than bare metal. They need a faster, more reliable path to production Kubernetes, without hiring a platform team or chasing datacenter tickets,” said Aaron Ginn, Co-founder & CEO of Hydra Host. “Our partnership with Aranya delivers exactly that. By bringing in Aranya for the Kubernetes layer, built on clusterdOS, we can now give customers a complete solution for deploying and scaling real workloads with far less complexity.”
Aranya Deploys Intelligence into the Infrastructure Itself The fresh funding will fuel Aranya’s next chapter: serving a growing customer base and launching its groundbreaking, AI-native multicluster interface. Aranya improves:
Workflow compression: Breaks down operational barriers and reduces data center-scale and multi-data center-scale workflows from weeks to minutes.
Compute accessibility: Allows every engineering team to manage millions of dollars in compute resources, regardless of their technical background.
Natural language control: Enables teams to operate the cluster in plain language, spinning up inference endpoints, provisioning VMs, and adding or removing nodes without touching config files or CLIs.
Proactive management: Monitors the cluster and resolves issues autonomously, with AI diagnosing and remediating problems before they cascade.
“We aim to give clusters an accessibility jump similar to the spread of personal computers in the nineties,” said Christian Bhatia Ondaatje, co-founder and CEO of Aranya. “This capital plants Aranya squarely at the center of that movement—the intelligent contact surface that connects massive GPU compute to the AI teams that need it yesterday.”
Building the Team to Match the Moment To support clusterdOS deployment and the product launch, Aranya is expanding its team across engineering and go-to-market:
Engineering: Platform engineers with depth in ArgoCD, Go, and Kubernetes; full-stack, frontend, and DevOps engineers for the dos interface; and SRE contractors for managed Kubernetes on-call.
Go-to-Market: Marketing and developer relations hires to cultivate the open-source community around clusterdOS and drive brand awareness.
About Aranya Founded by Christian Bhatia Ondaatje, Sasivarnan Kanaghasalam Sathyapriya, and Aryamika Bhatia Ondaatje, Aranya converts bare metal into custom, production-ready clusters in under 48 hours for fast-growing inference providers, AI startups, and data centers. Powered by clusterdOS, Aranya’s open-source distributed OS engine built on top of Kubernetes, which turns any quantity of raw bare metal servers into a self-healing, enterprise-grade, cohesive whole, reducing average downtime by 90%. Its proprietary technology, the AI-native multicluster operating system, gives teams direct, plain-language control over how inference or training is designed, scaled, and operated. The company is building toward a future where no AI company is limited by the gap between what they need and what their infrastructure can deliver. For more information, visit aranya.tech.
542,000-square-foot facility will deploy 32 new ENGEL molding systems, FANUC robotics, autonomous material handling and Krevera read-write AI while creating approximately 120 jobs
TIFFIN, Ohio, Sept. 1, 2026 — Nickolas Asset Management and Kreate today announced a $100 million investment in a 542,000-square-foot advanced manufacturing facility at 458 Second Avenue in Tiffin, Ohio.
The investment includes the facility, machinery, infrastructure, tooling and startup of an operation that will manufacture Kreate’s consumer and professional products.
The first machines have already arrived. Production is scheduled to begin October 1, 2026.
“Skilled trades plus technology is the future of American manufacturing,” said Nickolas Reinhart, founder and owner of Kreate. “The companies that win will put a full stack of technology in the hands of the best people. Tiffin brings both under one roof to create the most efficient and competitive manufacturing operation in our industry.”
The facility will operate 32 new ENGEL injection-molding machines equipped with iQ weight-control technology. The systems will be integrated with pick-and-place robots, FANUC collaborative robots, autonomous guided vehicles and automated packaging.
Krevera’s read-write computer-vision AI platform will connect production equipment, quality systems and factory operations. The technology will inspect output, identify process deviations, communicate directly with equipment and enable machines to make autonomous corrections in real time.
The connected system is designed to increase production speed, improve quality, reduce material usage and operate with significantly less waste.
“ENGEL and Dr. Stefan Engleder are true technology and integration partners,” Reinhart said. “They understand our scale, our speed and the level of performance we expect. We are not buying individual machines. We are building one complete manufacturing system.”
The Tiffin site offered an uncommon combination of scale, electrical capacity, rail access, warehousing and existing industrial infrastructure. These capabilities allowed Kreate to install new technology and launch production substantially faster than a ground-up development.
The facility also provides room to add equipment and expand manufacturing capacity as demand grows.
An integrated rail spur capable of holding 25 railcars will strengthen raw-material supply, simplify material movement and reduce resin, freight and handling costs. Extensive on-site warehousing will support high-volume production, inventory management and distribution.
The facility will also include on-site tool-and-die maintenance and repair. Kreate’s skilled trades team will be able to maintain, repair and optimize production tooling internally, reducing downtime and accelerating product launches.
Kreate expects the Tiffin operation to create approximately 120 jobs across skilled trades, tool-and-die repair, manufacturing, engineering, robotics, automation, maintenance and logistics.
About Kreate
Kreate is a product development company focused on reimagining product categories for today’s consumers. From ideation to realization, Kreate combines innovation, engineering and manufacturing expertise to develop differentiated products and bring better solutions to market.
About Nickolas Asset Management
Nickolas Asset Management (NAM) is an evergreen, operator-led family office built on permanent capital and a long-term ownership philosophy. NAM partners with management teams to strengthen essential businesses by investing in people, improving processes, and building better products.
Data-led selection pilot finds 100 high-growth Slovenian companies that have doubled combined revenues to €2.1 billion
Provides a blueprint for identifying Europe’s future champions as the EU mobilises up to €80 billion in scale-up investment via the European Investment Bank’s ETC 2.0
BLED, Slovenia, Sept. 1, 2026 — One hundred high-growth companies with the potential to become global champions have been identified through a new data-led selection model designed to help close Europe’s competitiveness gap with the US and China.
Unveiled at the Future 500 Forum in Bled, the Future 100 Slovenia intends to answer a critical question as it mobilizes billions of euros in new scale-up investment: can it identify its most promising companies early enough, and connect them sufficiently to compete globally?
Future 400 Event at Bled
Slovenia is the first country in which the Future 500 methodology has been applied in full, creating a pilot that the initiative ultimately intends to deploy across Europe.
Stjepan Orešković, founder of the Future 500 Initiative, said: “Europe is beginning to mobilize the capital it needs, but €80 billion will not make Europe more competitive simply because it is available. We need to identify our future champions earlier and ensure they obtain the capital, markets and expertise to compete globally.
Select, connect, support. This is the model we want to develop. We want to work with each company on its growth strategy and connect it with the right people and institutions.”
The Future 500 methodology was developed by an international research team at IEDC – Bled School of Management, working with researchers from Harvard, Oxford, the University of Edinburgh and ESMT Berlin, institutions across Central and Eastern Europe.
The Future 100 was unveiled at the Future 500 Forum – Powering Europe’s Scale-Up Engine: From Selection to Acceleration, held alongside the Bled Strategic Forum.
Participants included Andrej Plenković, Prime Minister of Croatia; Dr Anže Logar, Slovenia’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy, Labor and Sport; Marta Kos EU Commissioner for enlargement, Kerstin Jorna; Director-General of DG GROW at the European Commission; Michiel Scheffer president of the European Innovation Council, and representatives from the European Investment Bank, European Investment Fund, EBRD, Nasdaq and Google DeepMind.
The Future 500 Initiative argues that raising more capital is only half the answer. Europe must improve how it identifies potential winners and backs them.
NEW YORK, Sept. 1, 2026 — Black Pearl Equities, a New York-based investment group (together with its affiliates, “Black Pearl”), announced today that it has successfully completed its tender offer, through a wholly owned subsidiary, to purchase all of the outstanding shares of common stock of Selectis Health, Inc. (OTCQB: GBCS ) (“Selectis” or the “Company”), a healthcare company, for $5.75 per share in cash.
The tender offer expired at 5:00 p.m., New York City time, on August 31, 2026. As of the expiration, 2,789,027 shares had been validly tendered and not validly withdrawn, representing approximately 90.93% of Selectis’ outstanding shares of common stock. The conditions to the tender offer were satisfied, and Black Pearl has accepted for payment and will promptly pay the depositary for all validly tendered shares.
Black Pearl expects to complete the acquisition of Selectis through a merger without a vote or meeting of Selectis’ stockholders, pursuant to Section 16-10a-1108 of the Utah Revised Business Corporation Act. Each of the remaining shares of Selectis common stock not purchased in the tender offer will be converted into the right to receive the same $5.75 in cash per share that was paid in the tender offer. Upon completion of the merger, Selectis will become an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Black Pearl.
The information agent for the tender offer is Laurel Hill Advisory Group. Selectis stockholders who have questions regarding the tender offer should contact the information agent toll free at (844) 305-2265 or by email at [email protected].
Broadridge Corporate Issuer Solutions, LLC is acting as depositary for the tender offer.
Forward-Looking Statements
Statements in this press release regarding future financial and operating results, benefits of the transaction, future opportunities for Selectis’ business and any other statements concerning future expectations, beliefs, goals, plans or prospects constitute forward-looking statements. All forward-looking statements are inherently uncertain as they are based on various expectations and assumptions about future events, and they are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties and other factors that can cause actual events and results to differ materially from historical results and those projected. Risks and uncertainties include the ability of Black Pearl to successfully integrate Selectis’ business and the risk that the expected benefits of the transaction may not be realized or maintained. Neither Selectis nor Black Pearl undertakes to update any forward-looking statements as a result of new information or future events or developments.
About Selectis Health, Inc.
Selectis Health, Inc. is a healthcare owner-operator that acquires, develops, and manages skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities, and independent living facilities across the South and Southeastern United States. The Company currently operates eight properties in Arkansas and Oklahoma, providing post-acute and skilled nursing care, assisted and independent living services, and continuing care retirement programs, with reimbursement sourced through Medicare, Medicaid, and private pay arrangements. Selectis is focused on delivering quality resident care while pursuing strategic growth opportunities in an expanding senior healthcare market.
Contact
Selectis Health, Inc. 600 17th Street, Suite 2800 Denver, CO 80202
About Black Pearl
Black Pearl is a dynamic investment firm, advisory, and consultancy strategically diversified across healthcare sectors. Headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, Black Pearl fosters strategic synergies and facilitates high-impact transactions.
Contact
Anthony Vitellozzi Laurel Hill Advisory Group (844) 305-2265 [email protected]
SAN DIEGO, Sept. 1, 2026 — L’ATTITUDE Ventures, the largest Latino-focused early-stage venture capital firm investing in Latino(a) entrepreneurs, announced today that portfolio company Sunthetics, a pioneer in AI technology for chemical and pharmaceutical innovation, has been selected as a Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI) on a $19.5 million U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) initiative to build the next generation of AI-enabled autonomous laboratories.
Sunthetics, a L’ATTITUDE Ventures portfolio company, is based in San Marcos, Texas.
NSF’s Programmable Cloud Laboratories (PCL) Test Bed initiative will provide funding over four years to establish a nationwide network to test, scale and demonstrate novel methods and tools that advance automated science and engineering, accelerate discoveries and innovations across multiple fields, and strengthen U.S. leadership in scientific research and technology.
The San Marcos, Texas-based Sunthetics is part of a national network of 20 teams receiving a total of $400 million through NSF’s PCL initiative. The initiative represents a core NSF contribution to the U.S. government’s Genesis Mission, a national effort to harness AI for scientific discovery.
The project, led by Scripps Research in collaboration with UCLA and Sunthetics, will create an open, AI-guided platform for high-throughput chemical reaction discovery. The platform will integrate:
Advanced robotics and automation
AI models trained on chemical reactivity
Open data formats and FAIR-compliant standards
“It is a privilege for our team to be part of this initiative and help build the future of American innovation,” said Sunthetics CEO and Founder Daniela Blanco. “The partnerships and technologies built in this effort will result in breakthroughs that redefine how we leverage AI in science for decades to come.”
Sunthetics empowers chemical and pharmaceutical companies with a machine learning platform that leverages small datasets, including as few as five data points, to create data-driven roadmaps for R&D scientists. The platform guides experimentation and identifies product pathways, enabling Sunthetics’ partners to achieve better results in a fraction of the time and bring products to market faster than traditional processes.
L’ATTITUDE Ventures General Partner Laura Moreno Lucas said the NSF initiative represents an important opportunity to demonstrate the impact of diverse, women-led companies in shaping the future of AI and scientific discovery.
“This is what it looks like when women-led AI companies are at the table building the infrastructure of the next scientific revolution,” Lucas said. “Daniela and the Sunthetics team are proving that the best AI for science is built by diverse founders who understand the problem deeply. The future of autonomous discovery is open, and it’s being built now.”
About Sunthetics, Inc.
Sunthetics is a machine learning company specializing in accelerating innovation and sustainability in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries. Leveraging advanced machine learning algorithms and small datasets, Sunthetics’ software guides experimentation in chemical laboratories, empowering industries to reduce their carbon footprint while optimizing production efficiency. Founded with the mission of revolutionizing traditional manufacturing practices through democratized AI, Sunthetics has been recognized for its innovation in green technology and commitment to a sustainable future. For more information, visit www.sunthetics.io.
About L’ATTITUDE Ventures
With more than $100 million in assets under management, L’ATTITUDE Ventures is the largest Latino early-stage venture capital fund investing in technology-first visionary entrepreneurs. The fund provides capital, support, connections and visibility to empower founders building the next generation of innovative companies.
Led by Co-Founder and Managing Partner Sol Trujillo, and joined by partners Oscar Munoz, Laura Moreno Lucas and Pete Amaro, the team brings together experienced investors, proven entrepreneurs and global Fortune 100 executives to create value beyond capital. For more information, visit L’ATTITUDE Ventures.
Media Contact: Marie Lazzara JJR Marketing 630-400-3361 [email protected]
