SINGAPORE, April 27, 2023 — EMURGO VENTURES (“EMV”) – EMURGO Ventures, the investment arm of Cardano blockchain founding entity EMURGO, today officially announced the Cardano EMURGO BUILD 2023 Hackathon event in partnership with DoraHacks, the world’s most active multi-chain Web3 developer community.

The Cardano EMURGO BUILD 2023 Hackathon is the largest ever Cardano blockchain-focused Web3 hackathon organized by a Cardano founding entity and will award up to $2 million in total prizes to winning participants. The hackathon will have three different tracks for participants to build their prototypes: DeFi derivatives, aggregators, and zero-knowledge (ZK). Submissions will be decided by a panel of judges from EMURGO including founder and CEO Ken Kodama, EMURGO Ventures, Cardano Foundation, Input Output Global (IOG), Binance, Republic Crypto, and Wave Financial. Participation is open to anyone interested in building decentralized applications (dApps) on Cardano, including developers, designers, and entrepreneurs.

Cardano EMURGO BUILD 2023 Hackathon will be hosted virtually and submissions will be accepted starting in early May 2023. It will be held over several weeks to allow time for participants to research, build, and submit their solutions. EMURGO and DoraHacks will also feature video workshops during the hackathon period to help participants build their Web3 projects.

“EMURGO is thrilled to host a large hackathon for the Cardano ecosystem with the support of DoraHacks and our partners. Cardano has been one of the leading blockchain networks for developer activity over the past few years which shows the high interest in building the Cardano ecosystem,” said EMURGO founder and CEO Ken Kodama. “Cardano EMURGO BUILD 2023 provides a great opportunity for anyone in the world to demonstrate their talents.”

“Cardano is one of the largest web3 ecosystems in the world. As a chain-agnostic developer community and hackathon infrastructure, DoraHacks is keen to support builders and early-stage projects from the Cardano ecosystem,” said DoraHacks Head of BD Steve Ngok. “We are excited to work with EMURGO and Cardano for the first time through a flagship virtual hackathon, and looking forward to bringing long-term value to the ecosystem.”

Registration and more submission details are here.

Interested participants can also join the official Discord channel here.

About EMURGO Ventures
EMURGO Ventures (“EMV’) is the venture capital and investment arm of EMURGO, the official commercial arm and a founding entity of the Cardano blockchain. EMV focuses on investing in and supporting innovative Web3 projects and startups that have the potential to drive the adoption and integration of blockchain technology across various industries. Through strategic partnerships and investments, EMV is working to expand the possibilities of blockchain technology and bring it closer to mainstream adoption, while also contributing to the growth and development of the broader blockchain community.

To learn more, please visit https://emurgo.io.

For more information:
Albert Kim
Global PR Manager
[email protected]
+65 6978 5823

About DoraHacks
DoraHacks is a global hackathon organizer and one of the world’s most active multi-chain Web3 developer platforms. It creates a global hacker movement and provides crypto-native toolkits to help developers around the world team up and fund their ideas and BUIDLs via hackathons, bounties, grants, grant DAOs, and public good staking. By far, more than 4000 projects from the DoraHacks community have received over $30 million in grants and other forms of contributions from supporters worldwide. A large number of open-source communities, DAOs, and more than 50 major blockchain ecosystems are actively using Dora’s infrastructure for open-source funding and community governance.

For more information, please visit https://dorahacks.io

For more information:
Steve Ngok
Head of Business Development
[email protected]

SOURCE EMURGO Ventures

Investment will support critical US clinical programs and expand executive leadership team

SANTA CLARA, Calif., April 27, 2023 — AIxMed, an early-stage smart cytology company at the intersection of artificial intelligence (AI) and medicine, announced that it has raised $2.75 million in a SAFE round of financing from existing investors to further develop its digital cytology platform.

Upon market launch, the AIxMed platform will target bladder cancer monitoring and assisted-diagnosis through AIxURO. “Cytology is experiencing a digital transformation like other healthcare areas have experienced,” noted Samuel Chen, co-founder and CEO of AIxMed. “With our advanced AIxURO, we aim to impact bladder cancer care for the benefit of practitioners, labs, payers, and most especially patients.”

Bladder cancer is the fourth most common cancer in US men, yields a recurrence rate of greater than 74% over 10 years, and incurs over $9 billion in national expenditure for care (sources on file). The current diagnostic standard of care is cystoscopy, where a scope is inserted through the urethra and into the bladder. Patients often perceive this time-consuming manual method as uncomfortable, and invasive, and test results are reported in qualitative terms.

Alternatively, AIxURO performs analysis using a simple, comfortable, and non-invasive urine collection sample. In addition to saving time at the point of care, cytopathologists and technicians can automatically visualize whole slides faster than they could manually scan slides. Quantitative and qualitative data, based on The Paris System (TPS), are output from AIxURO and translated into meaningful clinical insights.

Fundraising proceeds will be used to add a Chief Medical Officer to its leadership team and to support validation studies prior to FDA submission. “Our validation studies in the U.S. are currently ahead of schedule, and we outperformed our development expectations. We look forward to submitting results to the FDA in the near future,” said Mr. Chen. He also adds that the next fundraising series to support commercialization efforts is slated for late 2023.

About AIxMed

AIxMed helps Pathologists digitize cytology samples in minutes and extract clinical insights in seconds to improve patient diagnosis and care. Our first application, AIxURO, is an AI-assisted urine cytology imaging and reporting software package for bladder cancer diagnosis and surveillance based on The Paris System (TPS). We recently concluded a pilot study and the results were published in Cancer Cytopathology. It is an RUO application at this time.

To learn more, visit https://www.aixmed.com.

SOURCE AIxMed, Inc.

Visa and BMO join Barclays and Aviva as Investors in FIL

NEW YORK, April 27, 2023 — Anthemis, a specialist asset manager that creates value from driving financial systems change, today announced additional investments from institutions including  Visa and BMO for its Female Innovators Lab (FIL) Fund. Anchored by Barclays, with investment from Aviva, the fund now totals $50 million, making it the largest early-stage fintech fund focused on female founders. With this latest raise, the Fund will invest in additional early-stage companies and continue its focus on designing, sourcing, and scaling female-founded embedded finance startups.

Launched in 2019 and led by Anthemis’ Global Head of Venture Studio, Katie Palencsar, the FIL Fund actively invests in women-led startups across North America, UK and Europe. FIL’s approach is modeled on Anthemis’ embedded finance investment thesis, targeting business models that deploy financial services within a diverse set of industries including sustainability, beauty, ecommerce, and more. FIL combines Anthemis early-stage asset management capacities with a singular network of strategic investors, diversifying deal sourcing and providing peerless strategic support to the FIL portfolio. 

Through the venture studio and fund, Anthemis has sourced over 1,500 early-stage female-founded companies and shaped and funded portfolio companies like Addition (a workplace financial wellness platform), Pile (a cash management tool for businesses), and Upkeep (a marketplace for beauty treatments).

“Women are half of the world’s population, they control 70% of global household spending, profits are higher when they’re present in the c-suite, and the startups they build have a more rapid path to exit – but somehow, women-led companies still raised just two percent of all US venture investment last year. Female founder businesses are a massive market opportunity, yet chronically underfunded. FIL is purpose-built to seize that opportunity, helping women develop high-growth, high-impact startups at the intersection of finance, technology, and society,” said Palencsar. “Expanding with a partner like Visa – a world leader in digital payments – and BMO – the 8th largest bank in North America by assets – gives us the capital, strategic partners, and global reach to unlock a new cohort of women leaders blazing the trail for fintech and embedded finance.”

“Women power economies around the world, yet they remain underrepresented in the fintech sector with many barriers to overcome,” said Charlotte Hogg, Visa Chief Executive Officer, Europe. “At Visa, we believe partnering with diverse businesses, banks and fintechs is essential. Only by doing so can innovative financial and business services be nurtured that cater to the needs of all communities and underrepresented groups. We are excited to partner with Anthemis to execute on our joint purpose of supporting women’s economic advancement and to help bring the benefits of going digital to everyone, everywhere.”

As one of the earliest asset managers to establish a diversity and inclusion mandate, Anthemis is uniquely suited to lead FIL. Women account for 69% of the people across investments, 48% of portfolio company founders are women or people of color and 58% of all employees at Anthemis are women.

“BMO’s investment in Anthemis’ Female Innovators Lab Fund is aligned with our Zero Barriers to Inclusion strategy, which includes creating economic progress and removing barriers to the inclusion of women and women-owned businesses everywhere,” said Andrew Harrison, Head of U.S. Partnerships at BMO. “Through our support for FIL and the continued success of WMNfintech, North America’s largest nonprofit fintech industry program for women-led fintechs developed by BMO and 1871, we are bridging the gender gap by giving more women the opportunity to bring innovative technology forward.”

To learn more about the Female Innovators Lab Fund or to pitch the team, please visit https://www.anthemis.com/female-innovators-lab/

About BMO
Serving customers for 200 years and counting, BMO is a highly diversified financial services provider – the 8th largest bank, by assets, in North America. With total assets of $1.15 trillion as of January 31, 2023, and a team of diverse and highly engaged employees, BMO provides a broad range of personal and commercial banking, wealth management and investment banking products and services to 12 million customers and conducts business through three operating groups: Personal and Commercial Banking, BMO Wealth Management and BMO Capital Markets.

About Anthemis
Anthemis is a specialist asset manager that creates value from driving financial systems change by investing in businesses committed to resiliency, transparency, access, and equity. Founded in 2010, our deep understanding of financial systems, endless passion for emerging technologies, and steadfast commitment to social purpose inspire everything we do. By creating fertile ground for a diverse group of startups, investors, entrepreneurs, institutions, academics, and visionaries to converge, we believe we can solve the financial system’s most pressing challenges.

SOURCE Anthemis Group

AUSTIN, Texas, April 27, 2023 — Outcomes Collective Growth Capital (“Outcomes Collective”) today announced having grown their mid-stage venture capital investment platform to over $50 million in assets under management. Their focus remains to invest in scale stage software companies in the healthcare and education sectors.

Since 2018, the firm has invested in 9 companies and realized 2 liquidity events. The firm is actively seeking new investment opportunities and expects to more than double its portfolio with new investments over the next 3 years. Notable investments to date include:

• SilverCloud Health, a leading digital mental health company which significantly reduces clinical depression and anxiety symptoms in patients. SilverCloud was acquired by American Well in 2021.
• Kiddom, a digital curriculum platform and management company deployed in hundreds of school districts across the country.
• Alpha Medical, a virtual and asynchronous women’s primary care platform that is making healthcare for women more accessible and affordable.
• Amira Learning, the first speech-AI based intelligent reading platform teaching children how to read.

Outcomes Collective’s investment model is centered around two key pillars of focus within the healthcare and education sectors:

• The firm leverages their 40+ healthcare and education sector Executive Advisors to help portfolio companies acquire new customers and partners as they grow in the market.
• The firm partners with leading family office investors and notable sector executives across the country to deploy capital into mid-stage venture capital in the healthcare and education sectors.

Based in Austin, Texas and investing nationwide, Outcomes Collective invests between $2 million and $5 million in scale stage software companies in the healthcare and education sectors who have differentiated products, an initial solid customer base of market adoption, and significant growth potential in front of them. The firm can lead investment rounds or join as a syndicate participant.

The firm is led by Rohit Seth who is the sole General Partner of the firm and has nearly 25 years of venture capital investment experience with prior investment roles at a multibillion-dollar family office and leading technology corporations.

Regarding the capital expansion, Seth said: “We are grateful for the support shown to us by our limited partner investors and are excited to invest in companies driving digital change in healthcare and education. The application of next generation artificial intelligence, end user engagement through mobile and SaaS, and end user specific personalization can create meaningful change and improvements in these industries. We look forward to working with such leading companies and helping them accelerate their impact and growth objectives.” 

Please visit www.outcomescollective.com for more information or contact [email protected].

SOURCE Outcomes Collective Growth Capital

NEW YORK, April 27, 2023 — Secro, a US-based technology company and digital bill-of-lading platform known as Secro e-Bill^™ today announced an oversubscribed $3.6M in seed funding led by Augment Ventures alongside TMV, with participation by Kluz Ventures and Grit and Gumption Ventures. Secro is co-founded and led by Michele Sancricca, former Head of Supply Chain Technology at Amazon Web Services and Director of Business Transformation at MSC—the world’s largest shipping company. Secro’s platform enables users to perform all the functions of a paper bill of lading with increased speed, seamless user interaction, lower cost and unmatched security, without the need for the cumbersome private agreements used by other electronic bill of lading (eBL) providers.

For centuries, trade documentation has been a time-consuming and resource-intensive process, requiring countless documents and significant contribution from key stakeholders. A single shipment can require up to 50 sheets of paper that get exchanged with up to 30 different parties. The bill of lading, (a detailed list of a shipment issued by the carrier as a form of receipt to the buyer), is one of the industry’s most important trade documents. McKinsey analysis estimates that it accounts for roughly 10-30% of total trade documentation costs. And yet, it remains largely reliant on the physical transfer of paper records.

Secro—built on the NEM Symbol private blockchain—solves this massive challenge by enabling users to easily export proof of original documents, attach supporting files to the e-bill of lading and convert the latter into paper form, seamlessly fulfilling the compliance prerequisites and local customs requirements. Secro also allows users to share their electronic bill of lading (eBL) with partners—allowing multiple teams to work together on eBL drafts—as well as invite internal and external employees to collaborate.

Said Augment Ventures Founder and Managing Partner, Sonali Vijayavargiya: “There has never been a digital bill-of-lading solution that functions like Secro. It’s a game-changer in an industry that is destined to witness seismic transformation in the next few years. The timing is right for Secro to streamline and massively impact the future of global trade.”

Remarks Marina Hadjipateras, General Partner at TMV: “The maritime and logistics industries have made great progress toward digitization and operations across the past several years; Secro is doubling down on that progress—and accelerating it—by addressing a core element of the global trade process, solving its challenges, and building sustainability practices into the industry.

While current electronic bill-of-lading (eBL) providers follow complex rulebooks that serve as a mutual agreement to treat the eBL as equivalent to its paper counterpart, Secro’s proprietary software leverages Singapore’s Electronic Transactions Act (ETA), which deems eBLs operationally equivalent to paper. Secro’s technology creates a digitally native token that represents the bill of lading on a digital ledger—in alignment with the requirements of Singapore law. Given the company’s innovative legal construct, Secro’s eBL has force of law and legal acceptability across the world under a simple user form—without the need for a private rulebook agreement.

In fact, Secro recently completed the world’s first-ever paperless end-to-end transfer without a private agreement, partnering with fertilizer trading company Nitron Group of Connecticut in a deal involving six counterparties across three continents to move a shipment of liquid fertilizer from North America to Chile.

Secro will use this fresh round of capital to officially scale its platform, develop new features, and expand its network of business partners.

Says Sancricca: “We are ready to create relationships with new businesses, evolve
our offering, and bring innovation and change to an industry that is long overdue.” 

SOURCE Secro Inc

SAN FRANCISCO, April 27, 2023 — Genstar Capital, a leading private equity firm focused on investments in targeted segments of the financial services, healthcare, industrials, and software industries, today announced the first and final closing of Genstar Capital Partners XI (“Fund XI”) with approximately $12.6 billion in total commitments. In addition, Genstar raised committed overage capacity from select limited partners which will co-invest in Fund XI’s larger transactions. The General Partner and affiliated entities are collectively the largest investor in Fund XI and will continue to be led by Managing Partners Ryan Clark, Jean-Pierre Conte, Rob Rutledge, Tony Salewski, and Eli Weiss.

Fund XI reached its hard cap with strong support from its existing investor base and an expanded group of limited partners, including leading global endowments and foundations, public and corporate pension plans, sovereign wealth funds, financial institutions, and family offices. Genstar’s previous fund, Genstar Capital Partners X, closed in April 2021 with approximately $10.2 billion of total committed capital.

Genstar will continue to make control investments in middle market companies primarily headquartered in North America. The firm is 100% employee owned and operates from a single office in San Francisco. The investment team is complemented by a group of 31 Strategic Advisors, who are current and former business leaders, working side by side with the Genstar investment team.

Evercore Partners served as Placement Agent for the fund and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP provided legal advice.

About Genstar
Genstar Capital (www.gencap.com) is a leading private equity firm that has been actively investing in high-quality companies for over 30 years. Based in San Francisco, Genstar works in partnership with its management teams and its network of strategic advisors to transform its portfolio companies into industry-leading businesses. Together with Genstar XI and all active funds, Genstar currently has approximately $49 billion of assets under management and targets investments focused on targeted segments of the financial services, healthcare, industrials, and software industries.

Contact: Chris Tofalli
Chris Tofalli Public Relations, LLC
914-834-4334

SOURCE Genstar Capital

About Biomica Ltd.:

Biomica is a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company developing innovative microbiome-based therapeutics utilizing MicroBoost AI tech-engine, licensed from Evogene. Biomica aims to identify and characterize disease-related microbiome entities and to develop novel therapeutics based on these understandings. The company is focused on the development of therapies for antibiotic resistant bacteria, immuno-oncology, and microbiome-related gastrointestinal (GI) disorders. Biomica is a subsidiary of Evogene Ltd. (Nasdaq: EVGN, TASE: EVGN).

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

About Evogene Ltd.:

Evogene Ltd. (Nasdaq: EVGN, TASE: EVGN) is a computational biology company aiming to revolutionize the development of life-science based products by utilizing cutting edge technologies to increase the probability of success while reducing development time and cost. Evogene established three unique tech-engines – MicroBoost AI, ChemPass AI and GeneRator AI – leveraging Big Data and Artificial Intelligence and incorporating deep multidisciplinary understanding in life sciences. Each tech-engine is focused on the discovery and development of products based on one of the following core components: microbes (MicroBoost AI), small molecules (ChemPass AI), and genetic elements (GeneRator AI).

Evogene uses its tech-engines to develop products through subsidiaries and strategic partnerships. Evogene’s subsidiaries currently utilize the tech-engines to develop human microbiome-based therapeutics by Biomica, ag-biologicals by Lavie Bio, ag-chemicals by AgPlenus, medical cannabis products by Canonic and castor varieties, for the biofuel and other industries, by Casterra. 

For more information, please visit www.evogene.com

Forward Looking Statements

This press release contains “forward-looking statements” relating to future events. These statements may be identified by words such as “may”, “could”, “expects”, “hopes” “intends”, “anticipates”, “plans”, “believes”, “scheduled”, “estimates”, “demonstrates” or words of similar meaning. For example, Evogene and its subsidiaries are using forward-looking statement in this press release when it discusses the BMC128 phase 1 immuno-oncology study and the advancement to phase 2 clinical trial; scale up and completion of GMP production of BMC333 in preparation for a phase 1 clinical trial for the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and advancement of additional programs. Such statements are based on current expectations, estimates, projections and assumptions, describe opinions about future events, involve certain risks and uncertainties which are difficult to predict and are not guarantees of future performance. Therefore, actual future results, performance or achievements of Evogene and its subsidiaries may differ materially from what is expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements due to a variety of factors, many of which are beyond the control of Evogene and its subsidiaries, including, without limitation, those risk factors contained in Evogene’s reports filed with the applicable securities authority. In addition, Evogene and its subsidiaries rely, and expect to continue to rely, on third parties to conduct certain activities, such as their field-trials and pre-clinical studies, and if these third parties do not successfully carry out their contractual duties, comply with regulatory requirements or meet expected deadlines, Evogene and its subsidiaries may experience significant delays in the conduct of their activities. Evogene and its subsidiaries disclaim any obligation or commitment to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or developments or changes in expectations, estimates, projections and assumptions.

Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1974949/Biomica.jpg
Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1947468/Evogene.jpg

SOURCE Biomica Ltd.

Proceeds to Support Key Efficacy Studies for ABI-2280 including Phase 2 Trial in High-Grade Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia (CIN 2,3) and Exploratory Study as Treatment for High-Risk HPV Infections

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, April 27, 2023 — Antiva Biosciences, a biopharmaceutical company developing novel, topical therapeutics for the treatment of pre-cancerous lesions caused by human papilloma virus (HPV) infection, today announced the closing of a $53 million Series E equity financing. The financing was supported by a syndicate of premier life science investors led by MPM-BioImpact Capital, and joined by the company’s existing investors including Canaan Partners, Sofinnova Investments, Adjuvant Capital, GV and Lumira Ventures, among others. In conjunction with the financing, president and chief executive officer Gail Maderis is transitioning to chairman of the company’s board of directors and is being succeeded as CEO by Kristine Ball. Additionally, Ms. Ball, along with Florencia Segal, M.D., and Brian Goodman, Ph.D., both of MPM-BioImpact Capital, will join the Antiva board.

Proceeds from the financing, which will fund the company into late 2025, will support the advancement of the company’s lead development candidate, ABI-2280, into key efficacy studies following completion of its ongoing Phase 1 trials. Planned studies include a Phase 2 clinical trial in high-grade cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (CIN 2,3) and an exploratory study as a potential treatment for high-risk HPV infection, specifically in subtypes that can lead to cancer. ABI-2280 has potent antiviral activity across all serotypes of HPV and works by both directly blocking HPV replication and inducing apoptosis in HPV-infected lesions, while sparing normal cells. Antiva has leveraged its development expertise to formulate a vaginal tablet of ABI-2280 that will enable self-administration at diagnosis and facilitate worldwide distribution, increasing impact potential for patients.

The treatment of high-risk HPV infections with ABI-2280 holds the potential to address a significant global health challenge. HPV infections account for nearly all cases of cervical cancer around the world and an accessible and effective treatment holds the promise to dramatically reduce these cancers. Currently, there are no treatments available to resolve HPV infections and prevent their development into cancer. This remains a crucial unmet medical need with more than 5.5 million women in United States alone affected by high-risk HPV infections each year despite ready access to vaccines.

“We believe that Antiva has the opportunity to make a transformative impact on global health across several large, unmet therapeutic indications with its ABI-2280 program and are thrilled to be able to lead this round of financing. The company has advanced the development of ABI-2280 to patients with CIN 2,3 and is now poised to expand clinical development into high-risk HPV infection. ABI-2280 can make the World Health Organization’s screen-and-treat approach to HPV infection a reality,” said Dr. Segal.

Dr. Goodman added, “With MPM-BioImpact’s growing focus on the field of virology, Antiva represents the type of impactful investment that we are looking to make in this space. We look forward to supporting Kristine in her new role as CEO and seeing the continued progress that is made under her leadership.”

Ms. Ball joins Antiva with more than 20 years of executive experience in the life sciences industry across companies of all stages ranging from discovery to clinical to commercial. She has significant transactional expertise, having participated in multiple initial public offerings, corporate M&A deals, partnerships and financings. Ms. Ball most recently served as chief executive officer of Soteria Biotherapeutics, a venture backed immuno-oncology company and previously held leadership positions at Menlo Therapeutics, Relypsa, Inc., and KAI Pharmaceuticals, and served on the board of Forty Seven, Inc., until its acquisition by Gilead.  Ms. Ball currently sits on the board of Atreca, Inc., a publicly traded, clinical-stage oncology company.

“I am deeply grateful for this opportunity to join Antiva at such an exciting time in the company’s maturation. ABI-2280 has tremendous potential to play a significant role in advancing both global health and women’s health, bringing about a long-needed breakthrough in HPV infections and HPV-related cancers in both men and women,” stated Ms. Ball. “I am eager to carry forward the significant momentum that has been generated by the Antiva team and look forward to the important upcoming clinical development milestones that will move us closer to this goal. I am also excited to be able to work closely with Gail in her new role as board chair, leaning on the experience and knowledge she has gained during her time as president and CEO.”   

“I take great pride in turning the CEO role over to Kristine with the company in such a strong position following this transformative financing. She is a talented and experienced life science executive who is perfectly suited to lead Antiva as it expands clinical development of ABI-2280,” said Ms. Maderis. “I look forward to remaining intimately connected to the company in the role of board chair and offer a special thanks to Steve James, who has provided Antiva with great leadership and guidance as board chair and will remain an executive advisor to the company.”

About HPV-Related Diseases and Cervical Cancer

Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) is so common that nearly all sexually active men and women are infected with the virus at some point in their lives. Many of these are transient infections the body is capable of clearing, but this typically takes months to years.  When the infections persist, they are known to drive the formation of malignancies, including cervical, anal, vulvar, penile, and head and neck cancers.

The introduction of prophylactic vaccines for HPV was a major step forward in the fight against HPV-associated cancers by preventing infection by certain high-risk HPV subtypes. However, due to low adoption rates in the US, EU, and Japan, and limited access to the vaccines in developing countries, HPV infections and the disease states driven by such infections remain a major unmet clinical need.

Globally, cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer in women and as such represents a major public health problem. According to the World Health Organization, an estimated 604,000 women were diagnosed with cervical cancer worldwide and approximately 342,000 women died from the disease in 2020.

About Antiva Biosciences
Antiva Biosciences, Inc. is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing novel, topical therapeutics for the treatment of diseases caused by HPV infection. The company, based in South San Francisco, was founded in 2012 by Dr. Karl Hostetler of The University of California San Diego. The company’s lead drug candidate, ABI-2280 is being developed as a topical treatment for high-grade cervical intraepithelial neoplasia (HSIL, CIN 2,3) and for women with high-risk HPV infection.

For more information, please visit: www.antivabio.com.

Contact Information:

Kristine Ball
Antiva Biosciences, Inc.
650-822-1400
[email protected]

Tim Brons
Vida Strategic Partners (media)
646-319-8981
[email protected]

SOURCE Antiva Biosciences, Inc.

Funding round led by Owl Ventures follows DeepHow’s 3x year-over-year growth since launching its enterprise AI-powered knowledge-capture and learning platform

DETROIT, April 27, 2023 — DeepHow, the AI company that turns technical know-how into smart, how-to training videos, has closed $14M in Series A funding. Owl Ventures, a specialist in education technology investing, led the round, with participation from another new investor: LG Technology Ventures. Existing investors Sierra Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures, Osage Venture Partners, and Foothill Ventures also participated in this round.

DeepHow plans to invest in go-to-market initiatives to accelerate its business growth, and to ramp up its investments in product, engineering, and generative AI innovation. In response to customer demand, DeepHow has already fast-tracked development of powerful product enhancements that leverage the power of generative AI to accelerate SOP video creation, multimodal workflow generation, AI chat assistance, and strategic knowledge mapping.

“Today, manufacturers are under intense pressure to improve efficiency and reduce costs while meeting growing customer demands. At the heart of this transformation is Industry 4.0, which leverages advanced technologies such as AI, IoT, and automation to achieve operational excellence,” said Dr. Sam Zheng, CEO and co-founder of DeepHow. “Realizing the full potential of Industry 4.0 requires more than just technology investment, it also requires a strategic approach to capturing, sharing, and transferring knowledge across teams and departments. This oversubscribed Series A round underscores that our investors share our vision. It also demonstrates their confidence in our ability to build on our technical leadership and accelerate our go-to-market operations.”

DeepHow’s compelling value proposition for the manufacturing and service industries is fueled by the confluence of several industry trends that are driving demand for workers who can quickly assimilate technical skills. Among the forces that are shaping industry globally are the rapid evolution of advanced technology in use on the factory floor, the digitalization of manufacturing associated with Industry 4.0, the restructuring of global supply chains, and a paradigm shift in the way people prefer to learn.

“The need to capture the skills and know-how of senior, experienced workers—and then transfer that knowledge through engaging and efficient training during on-boarding and through reskilling initiatives has never been more important,” said Ian Chiu, managing director at Owl Ventures. “Over 70+ global customers, the majority of them multinational enterprise companies, are leveraging DeepHow’s AI-powered training platform to streamline the capture and transfer of technical skills and know-how — compressing project time by 10x, boosting worker performance by 25%, and dramatically reducing overall training and development costs. We’re excited to be partnering with Sam, Patrik, and the entire DeepHow as they continue to scale and expand on their market leadership.”

“At LG Technology Ventures, we are excited to support visionary founders who are leading the Industrial 4.0 era,” said Anshul Agarwal, managing director of LG Tech Ventures. “Ever since we met Sam and Patrik, we were impressed by their obsession with customers and the design-led product that they have built. We look forward to partnering closely with the DeepHow team as they deploy their product to factories around the world.”

“The growing skills gap and consequent loss of productivity in the manufacturing industry will cause a paradigm shift in technical training and I am thrilled to continue to support DeepHow on their mission to become the leading solution in this sector,” said Ben Yu, managing partner at Sierra Ventures.

About LG Technology Ventures

LG Technology Ventures, established in 2018 in Silicon Valley, is the venture capital investment arm of the Korea-based LG Group. Its team consists of experienced investors, entrepreneurs, technologists, and industry domain experts. LG Technology Ventures manages over $480 million of fund assets and invests in early-stage startups in artificial intelligence, mobility, electrification, advanced materials, climate technologies, life-sciences, next generation display, XR, Web3, mobile, and 5G. They create value for LG portfolio companies by helping them develop strategic partnerships with LG Companies. For more information, please visit lgtechventures.com. 

About Owl Ventures

Owl Ventures is the largest venture capital fund in the world focused on the EdTech market, with over $2 billion in assets under management. The Silicon Valley-based firm invests in the world’s leading education technology companies across the education spectrum, encompassing PreK-12, higher education, future of work (career mobility/professional learning), and “EdTech+” (the intersection of EdTech and other major industries). Owl Ventures has deep domain expertise and leverages a global network of limited partners, investors, and strategic partners to help entrepreneurs scale their businesses into transformative category leading companies. Learn more at OwlVC.com. Owl’s annual Education Outcomes Report can be viewed at OwlVC.com/outcomes.

About DeepHow

DeepHow was founded in 2018 by a team of ex-Siemens researchers and engineers who saw an unmet need to transfer knowledge in the skilled workforce market. They developed an AI-powered, video-centric knowledge-capture and learning platform that bridges the skills gap in the manufacturing, service, and construction industries. DeepHow streamlines the capture and transfer of technical skills and know-how — compressing project time by 10x, boosting worker performance by 25%, and dramatically reducing overall training and development costs. For more information, visit deephow.com.

SOURCE DeepHow Corporation