Funding will accelerate pilot-scale production of lithium-6 and lithium-7 isotopes, strengthening a critical domestic supply chain for next-generation energy technologies.

SANTA FE, N.M., Aug. 31, 2026 — Molten Salt Solutions, Inc. (MSS), a New Mexico-based company with a novel large-scale production method for enriching lithium, announced the closing of an oversubscribed $7 million round of seed funding. The round was led by Dolby Family Ventures with participation from Vanedge Capital Partners, Alumni Ventures, Gaingels, True Ventures, and Future Ventures. 

Fusion systems require large, reliable supplies of enriched lithium-6. Lithium-7 is used in advanced fission molten salt reactors. Currently, the United States lacks commercial-scale production of either isotope, making rebuilding the secure, domestic source of both isotopes a recognized national priority for energy security. 

“Fusion and small modular fission reactors are racing toward commercialization and are necessary to meet growing global power demands. Both depend on a secure domestic supply of enriched lithium. MSS meets this need,” said John Elling, CEO of Molten Salt Solutions. “This investment enables us to scale our technology and production capability to meet the demands of advanced reactors today and in the future.”

The financing will accelerate MSS’s transition from laboratory-validated technology to pilot-scale production fulfilling active customer agreements, expand the technical and operations teams, and deepen partnerships across the fusion and advanced nuclear supply chain. The company is also advancing a broader portfolio of enriched isotopes to serve emerging markets. 

This raise follows MSS’s $3 million pre-seed and more than $5 million in grant funding, including support through New Mexico’s Advanced Energy Award. 

About Molten Salt Solution: Molten Salt Solutions, Inc. (MSS) is a New Mexico based company producing enriched stable isotopes for fusion and the advanced nuclear market. Founded by serial entrepreneurs and isotope enrichment leaders from Los Alamos National Laboratory, MSS has developed a proprietary platform that is 100X more efficient than legacy enrichment approaches. MSS is building a secure domestic supply of high-purity lithium-6 and lithium-7 for the fusion and advanced-nuclear sectors, alongside a growing portfolio of enriched isotopes for advanced technologies. Learn more at https://moltensaltsolutions.com; [email protected]. 

About Dolby Family Ventures: Dolby Family Ventures (“DFV”) is an early-stage venture capital firm. Founded in 2014, DFV formalizes the Dolby family’s ongoing, multi-generational commitment to Ray Dolby’s legacy of discovering and supporting visionary entrepreneurs. DFV focuses on seed and pre-seed investments across a range of science- and technology-driven sectors, including climate, robotics and automation, aerospace, digital innovation, and compute, as well as on disease-modifying treatments in neurodegeneration and neuropsychiatry. Advanced energy solutions has been an active area of investment for the firm over the past decade, having made over 10 investments since 2016 supporting this thesis. DFV is not affiliated with Dolby Laboratories, Inc. For more information, visit www.dolbyventures.com. 

About Vandege Capital: Vanedge Capital is an early-stage venture capital fund based in Vancouver, Canada. Founded in 2010, the firm partners with founders solving hard technology problems across energy, advanced materials, computing, artificial intelligence, computational biology, and defense. Notable investments include SpaceX, Echodyne, Mojo Vision, Canalyst, and Raxium. For more information, visit vanedgecapital.com.

About Alumni Ventures: Alumni Ventures is one of the most active venture firms in the world, making startup investing more accessible for individuals. Powered by an 850,000+ member network of alumni, founders, experts, investors, and subscribers, AV co-invests alongside leading firms like Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia, and NEA. The firm regularly invests in the nuclear and broader energy sectors, backing companies such as Pacific Fusion, X-Energy, Aalo Atomics, Radiant Nuclear, Thea Energy, Realta Fusion, and Valar Atomics.

Since its founding in 2014, Alumni Ventures has raised over $1.6 billion from over 25,000 Investors and Syndicate Members, and invested in 1,800+ companies across every major sector and stage. The firm has been named one of PitchBook’s most active U.S. venture firms every year since 2018, and was ranked #20 in Time Magazine’s list of America’s Top Venture Capital Firms of 2025. Learn more at av.vc.

About Gaingels: Gaingels is amongst the largest investors in the world aiming to show the world that equity of access and representation in venture capital delivers positive returns. Learn more at https://gaingels.com/.

About True Ventures: True Ventures is a Silicon Valley venture capital firm that is first to believe in brilliant founders and invests in them at the earliest stages, when partnership matters most. Founded in 2005, the firm manages $4 billion in committed capital across over 450 teams spanning AI, software, hardware, cybersecurity, consumer, digital biology, and more. Notable investments include Enveda, Iceye, Handshake, Basecamp Research, Peloton, Duo Security, Ring, HashiCorp, and more. For more information visit www.trueventures.com.

About Future Ventures: Future Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm investing in frontier technologies that have the potential to transform industries and address some of the world’s most consequential challenges. Founded in 2018, the firm manages over $1.4B in committed capital and partners with visionary founders at the earliest stages, focusing on breakthrough science and engineering across energy, advanced computing, AI, biotechnology, aerospace, robotics, novel chemistry, and beyond. Future Ventures has a long-standing focus on advanced energy, with investments spanning fusion, next-generation nuclear, energy storage, critical materials, and other technologies aimed at enabling abundant, reliable, and sustainable energy. Notable investments include Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Realta Fusion, Subcritical Systems, and Red Metals. For more information, visit future.ventures.

SOURCE Molten Salt Solutions

Carrick provides liquidity for existing Limited Partners and reinforces long-term conviction in Saviynt while the security leader surpasses $300 million in ARR and launches Zuma, its enterprise AI identity security platform

SAN FRANCISCO and NEWPORT BEACH, Calif., Aug. 31, 2026 — Carrick Capital Partners (“Carrick”), a growth-oriented investment firm focused on operationally scaling B2B software and technology-enabled businesses, today announced the closing of a single-asset continuation vehicle (the “CV”) for Saviynt (the “Company”), a leading identity security company, with approximately $600 million in capital commitments. The transaction includes a new $255 million investment in the Company with meaningful participation from Carrick’s GPs, representing the largest investment in the firm’s history.

Coller Capital was the lead investor and HSBC Asset Management acted as co-lead investor in the new vehicle, which offered Carrick’s existing limited partners the option to roll their equity into the CV or realize a 11x gross multiple (10x net) on invested capital in Carrick’s initial investment. Carrick’s new investment was made as part of the final close of Saviynt’s Series B financing and helped fund a tender offer that provided liquidity to Company employees. Together, the transactions extend Carrick’s partnership with a proven platform and align the firm with Saviynt’s management team and new Series B investors in delivering long-term value.

The closing comes amid accelerating momentum at Saviynt. The Company recently announced that it has surpassed $300 million in annual recurring revenue, up from approximately $10 million at the time of Carrick’s initial investment. This year, Saviynt has grown bookings by more than 80% while maintaining a 96% customer retention rate. Saviynt also launched Zuma, its enterprise AI identity security platform, which gives organizations a unified control plane to discover, protect, and govern AI agents, LLMs, and non-human identities alongside the human workforce. Zuma extends the Saviynt Identity Cloud, which converges identity governance and administration, privileged access management, application access governance, and identity security posture management to secure every identity across an organization’s applications, data, and infrastructure. This momentum, and customers’ urgent focus on unified identity security as they deploy AI at scale, drove the Company’s $700 million Series B at a valuation of approximately $3 billion.

Carrick identified Saviynt through the firm’s thematic sourcing work in cybersecurity, and built a relationship with the founding team before they raised institutional capital. As Saviynt’s only institutional investor until their Series B, Carrick led the Company’s $35 million Series A and supported Saviynt’s growth with follow-on financings while partnering closely with management on leadership expansion, go-to-market, and board development through the firm’s ABV (Approach to Building Value).

“Our limited partners entrust us to source exceptional companies before others see them, concentrate behind our highest-conviction ideas, and build durable value through operating performance rather than financial engineering,” said Marc McMorris, Co-CEO of Carrick. “This transaction delivered on that promise, providing our LPs a meaningful realization alongside the choice to stay invested in the Company’s next chapter. The caliber of investors who backed the vehicle speaks to the strength of both Saviynt and the Carrick model,” added Co-CEO Jim Madden.

“We underwrote a simple thesis years ago: identity would become the control plane of enterprise security. The AI era has proven it. Enterprises cannot deploy AI they cannot trust, which makes identity security the business enabler for AI adoption at scale,” said Chris Wenner, Managing Director at Carrick and Saviynt board member. “Saviynt built the unified platform to govern every identity, human, non-human, and AI agent, and we are tripling down because we believe it will be the leader in unified identity.”

 “The defining security problem of the AI era is that enterprises are now accountable for AI agents and non-human identities that act at machine speed. The platform we have built solves this problem by providing visibility, protection, and governance,” said Sachin Nayyar, Founder and CEO of Saviynt. “Carrick has been our partner and shared our vision from our first institutional round when Saviynt was focused on cloud-native identity governance, through our evolution to address AI-era identity security. This capital commitment underscores their continuing conviction and strengthens our ability to move even faster for our customers.”

The new capital positions Saviynt to accelerate product development across the Identity Cloud and Zuma, extend its leadership in AI and agentic identity security, and deepen integrations with hyperscalers, SaaS platforms, and global systems integrators, while continuing to serve its blue-chip base of enterprise customers worldwide.

Robert W. Baird & Co. served as financial advisor to Carrick. Proskauer Rose LLP served as legal counsel to Carrick on the CV, and Latham & Watkins LLP served as legal counsel to Carrick on its new investment.

About Carrick Capital Partners

Headquartered in San Francisco and Newport Beach, Carrick Capital Partners is a growth-oriented investment firm that operationally scales B2B software and technology-enabled businesses. Carrick invests thematically in sectors where the firm has deep domain expertise, sourcing the majority of its investments through long-term, proprietary relationships with founders, and is frequently the first institutional capital in its portfolio companies. Through its ABV (Approach to Building Value), Carrick takes a concentrated approach and dedicates significant resources post-investment, partnering with management teams to drive growth, retention, and margin expansion through automation and AI enablement. For more information, please visit www.carrickcapitalpartners.com.

About Saviynt

Saviynt is the identity security platform built to secure the modern enterprise. The Saviynt Identity Cloud manages, secures, and governs access for human, non-human, and AI agent identities across an organization’s applications, data, and infrastructure, and with Zuma, its enterprise AI identity security platform, Saviynt helps organizations build, run, and scale AI with confidence. The world’s leading brands trust Saviynt to reduce risk, improve visibility, and support compliance while enabling business agility. For more information, please visit www.saviynt.com.

About Coller Capital

Coller Capital is a global leader in the secondary market for private assets, renowned for being a pioneer and innovator in the asset class. Founded in 1990, Coller provides investment and liquidity solutions to private market investors worldwide, and currently manages $55* billion in private equity, private credit, and other private market vehicles. With headquarters in London and offices across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific, our multinational team offers a truly global reach.

Coller has exclusively focused on secondary investing since inception and today boasts one of the largest dedicated investment teams in the asset class.

 Coller’s Private Wealth Secondaries Solutions (PWSS) business offers perpetual funds to eligible private wealth investors globally.

For more information, visit www.collercapital.com

*As at 31 March 2026

About HSBC Asset Management

HSBC Asset Management should be referred to either in full or as HSBC AM to avoid confusion with any other financial services firms.

HSBC Asset Management, the investment management business of the HSBC Group, invests on behalf of HSBC’s worldwide customer base of retail and private clients, intermediaries, corporates and institutions through both segregated accounts and pooled funds. HSBC Asset Management connects HSBC’s clients with investment opportunities around the world through an international network of offices in 20 countries and territories, delivering global capabilities with local market insight. As at 30 June 2026, HSBC Asset Management managed assets totalling US$928bn (excluding HSBC Jintrust Fund Management Company Limited) on behalf of its clients.

For more information see http://www.global.assetmanagement.hsbc.com 

HSBC Asset Management is the brand name for the asset management businesses of HSBC Holdings plc.

Media Contact
Machie Madden
[email protected]
917.868.2358

Disclosures: This press release is provided for informational purposes only and is not an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, securities or interests in any fund managed by Carrick Capital Partners. Past performance, including the gross multiple on invested capital referenced herein, is not indicative of future results. Gross performance figures do not reflect the deduction of management fees, carried interest, or other expenses, which would reduce returns to investors. The statements quoted above from persons who are not clients of Carrick were made without compensation and reflect solely their own opinions and experience with Carrick. Portfolio company executives may be subject to certain conflicts of interest. Carrick Capital Partners is an investment adviser registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission; registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training.

SOURCE Carrick Capital Partners

Financing supports advancement of late-stage infectious disease pipeline, including Lonafarnib for the treatment of chronic hepatitis D

KIRKLAND, Wash., Aug. 31, 2026 — EIT Pharma, Inc. (“EIT Pharma” or the “Company”), a biotechnology company focused on developing therapies for infectious diseases, today announced the successful close of an oversubscribed $35 million Series A financing round. The round was led by Propel Bio Partners, with participation from Good Ventures, Arrowtown, and others.

The financing follows the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) acceptance of the New Drug Application (NDA) for lonafarnib for the treatment of chronic hepatitis D (CHD), a serious life-threatening liver disease caused by hepatitis D virus (HDV) in individuals who already have hepatitis B virus infection. Lonafarnib is an investigational first-in-class oral CHD therapy candidate with a unique mechanism of action. If approved, lonafarnib’s oral administration and room-temperature storage may offer practical advantages for people impacted by CHD and healthcare providers who consider quality of life, treatment burden, and accessibility when evaluating treatment options.

Proceeds from the funding will support continued FDA review activities related to lonafarnib, and future manufacturing and commercial readiness steps for lonafarnib, subject to regulatory approval. The funding will also assist with the advancement of EIT Pharma’s infectious disease pipeline and general corporate operations.

“This oversubscription of this round is a validation of EIT Pharma’s founding belief that advancing important medicines is about recognizing unrealized potential and assembling the scientific, clinical, regulatory, and commercial expertise to turn that potential into a treatment for patients,” said Dr. Leen Kawas, PhD, Chief Executive Officer of EIT Pharma. “This new capital allows us to continue advancing lonafarnib through the review process and, subject to FDA approval, prepare to bring it to patients.”

“EIT Pharma pairs a differentiated, late-stage asset with a team experienced in moving complex programs through development and regulatory review,” said Richard Kayne, General Partner of Propel Bio Partners. “We see meaningful value potential across EIT Pharma’s infectious disease pipeline, and we’re backing a management team with the scientific, clinical, and commercial discipline to realize it. We’re proud to support EIT Pharma at this pivotal stage as it works to bring important new therapies to underserved patient communities.”

About Lonafarnib

Lonafarnib is an investigational oral therapy candidate being evaluated for the treatment of chronic hepatitis D. Lonafarnib is designed to target a key step in the hepatitis D virus lifecycle and is currently the only oral therapeutic candidate in late-stage clinical development for chronic hepatitis D. Lonafarnib has not been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or any other regulatory authority for the treatment of chronic hepatitis D. The safety and efficacy of lonafarnib have not been established.

About EIT Pharma, Inc.

EIT Pharma is a biotechnology company focused on advancing therapies for infectious diseases with significant unmet medical needs. The company is developing a portfolio of programs designed to address serious infectious diseases through rigorous science, disciplined execution, and a patient-centered approach focused on translating scientific innovation into meaningful real-world impact for patients.

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements regarding regulatory review timelines, anticipated milestones, potential product characteristics, and future development plans. These statements are based on current expectations and assumptions and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. Lonafarnib is an investigational product candidate and has not been approved by the FDA. There can be no assurance that the FDA will approve the NDA or that the product will become commercially available. EIT undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements except as required by law.

Media Contact

Reevemark
Jacqueline Zuhse/Jill Steinman
[email protected]
212-433-4600

SOURCE EIT Pharma

SUZHOU, China, Aug. 31, 2026 — Convergen, a biotechnology company pioneering targeted protein degradation (TPD) therapies for diseases driven by pathological protein aggregates, today announced the closing of a $15 million Seed+ financing round. This round was led by MPCi, with participation from LAV, BioTrack Capital and a leading biotech fund. Prior to this round, the company raised $10 million in a seed financing round led exclusively by Qiming Venture Partners.

The proceeds will be used to further advance Convergen’s proprietary degrader platform and accelerate its pipeline for neurodegenerative disorders and other protein aggregation diseases.

“We are grateful to the distinguished group of investors and their confidence in our science, platform and team,” said Dr. Jinquan Sun, CEO of Convergen. “We have made significant progress in advancing our protein degradation platform. This financing will enable us to accelerate our lead asset toward the clinic while continuing to advance our pipeline, with the goal of bringing new therapeutic options to patients with neurodegenerative diseases and beyond.”

Addressing a Critical Unmet Need
Neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s represent one of the largest unmet medical needs globally, with pathologic protein aggregation at the core. Convergen’s scientific founder Prof. Ting Han, whose laboratory reported the first TRIM21 molecular glue, established the proof-of-concept of the first TrimTAC degrader (November 2024 in Cell) which targets protein aggregopathies by exploiting TRIM21’s unique property. Beyond neurodegeneration, TrimTAC has demonstrated potential in selectively degrading other targets for autoimmune diseases.

MPCi said: 
“Convergen’s degrader platform is truly differentiated in the targeted protein degradation landscape. Matrix Partners China has long adhered to an investment philosophy of ‘investing early, investing in high barriers, and investing in differentiation,’ with a focus on the application potential of breakthrough technology platforms across disease areas. We are highly confident in the extensibility of Convergen’s original platform and in the team’s ability to translate scientific discovery into clinical drugs. We look forward to partnering with the company to advance novel therapeutic options to patients worldwide.”

About Convergen
Convergen is a biotechnology company pioneering the next-generation targeted protein degradation technology designed to selectively eliminate pathological protein aggregates. Founded to address the significant unmet medical needs in neurodegenerative disease and beyond, the company combines cutting-edge academic research with industry-proven drug development expertise.

SOURCE Convergen

Ben Nager joins as a Partner with Counsel Shelley Azizi and paralegal John ‘Jack’ McCann.

NEW YORK, Aug. 31, 2026 — Norm Law LLP, an AI-native full-service law firm running on the Norm Ai platform, today announced the expansion of its Private Funds practice with the addition of Ben Nager, Shelley Azizi, and John ‘Jack’ McCann.

Nager joins Norm Law from Sidley Austin as a Partner to lead the firm’s Blue Sky filings and state securities regulatory capabilities within its Private Funds practice. He is joined by Counsel Shelley Azizi and paralegal Jack McCann, both former Sidley colleagues, bringing together an established team with deep experience managing state and federal securities filings for institutional investment funds.

“Ben, Shelley, and Jack bring an established practice grounded in detailed knowledge of securities requirements across all 50 states,” said Mike Schmidtberger, Chair of Norm Law and former Chair of the Executive Committee of Sidley Austin, “I worked with Ben and Shelley for many years and am glad to be reunited with them.”

Norm Ai has developed technology that incorporates jurisdiction-specific filing requirements, deadlines, fees, and other rules into a central workflow. The platform organizes fund and investor information, identifies upcoming obligations, flags missing or inconsistent data, and gives clients direct visibility into required actions and filing status. Norm Law attorneys remain responsible for reviewing the applicable rules, resolving legal questions, and completing filings with federal and state regulators.

“Norm Ai and Norm Law uniquely integrate world-class legal talent with the frontier of legal AI,” said John Nay, founder and CEO of Norm Ai. “Norm Ai embeds deep knowledge of the relevant laws and regulations into software that drives faster, more consistent outcomes for clients. This is exactly why we built an AI company and a full service law firm together.”

“Blue Sky work involves hundreds of jurisdiction-specific requirements, recurring deadlines, and large volumes of fund and investor data,” said Scott Worland, Chief Technology Officer at Norm Ai. “Our engineers built a platform that turns that complexity into a structured workflow. Clients submit information in one place, relevant obligations are surfaced automatically, and the legal team can focus on the exceptions and decisions that require judgment.”

Nager brings almost 30 years of experience advising investment banking and fund management clients on securities regulatory matters. He has coordinated Form D and state notice filings for hedge funds, commodity pools, and private equity funds and led large-scale, 50-state remediation projects involving registration and exemption issues. He has also helped obtain FINRA approval for hundreds of initial and secondary offerings by REITs, SPACs, banks, corporate issuers, commodity ETFs, and commodity pools.

Azizi joins Norm Law as Counsel, bringing 20 years of experience advising pooled investment funds, including hedge funds, private equity funds, REITs, and other private entities, on federal and state securities regulatory matters, with an emphasis on Regulation D offerings. McCann joins as a Paralegal, supporting the team’s Blue Sky and related securities filing work.

Clients representing more than $35 trillion in assets under management leverage Norm Ai. Norm Law uses the same technology to serve institutional clients as outside counsel. These additions expand Norm Law’s ability to support clients across private funds, securities regulation, technology transactions, intellectual property, M&A, and other high-stakes matters.

About Norm Ai

Norm Ai builds agentic law, embedding law into AI agents. Its systems help govern how AI operates in high-stakes, regulated environments across a client base representing more than $35 trillion in combined assets under management. Norm Ai also powers Norm Law, the first AI-native law firm built for institutional clients. Norm Ai has raised more than $260 million from Khosla Ventures, Craft Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures, Coatue, Blackstone, Vanguard, Citi, New York Life, TIAA, Henry R. Kravis, and Marc Benioff. For more information, visit norm.ai.

About Norm Law

Norm Law is the first AI-native full-service law firm. Norm Law’s model is designed to help its attorneys analyze those materials, identify issues, and move transactions forward efficiently while remaining focused on clients’ commercial objectives. It combines top-tier legal talent with AI agents powered by Norm Ai to deliver legal work with greater speed, consistency, and scale. For more information, visit normlaw.com.

Media Contact: [email protected] 

SOURCE Norm Law

Singapore technology company in Riyadh to explore extending Robin AI’s food-compliance capabilities across ASEAN and MENA

SINGAPORE and RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, Aug. 31, 2026 — Singapore-founded technology company Smobler is exploring the expansion of Robin AI, a platform originally developed to help Hawaiʻi food entrepreneurs navigate U.S. food-safety requirements, toward Halal compliance workflows across Southeast Asia and the Middle East.

Smobler Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer Mridhul Pax will be in Riyadh for LEAP 2026, August 31–September 3, meeting partners across food technology, enterprise AI and digital trade.

The move reflects Smobler’s broader bet on vertical AI: as access to increasingly capable AI models becomes ubiquitous, competitive advantage will shift toward specialised applications solving expensive, persistent and industry-specific problems.

From Recipe to Market
Smobler launched Robin AI in Hawaiʻi in June 2026 to address a challenge familiar to small food producers: turning a recipe into a market-ready product requires navigating complex regulatory and food safety requirements.

Developed with Wahiawā Value-Added Product Development Center and Leeward Community College, Robin helps early-stage food and beverage entrepreneurs generate draft nutrition labels and Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) food-safety plans. The platform is designed to support food safety specialists and regulatory authorities. 

Smobler is exploring how that approach could extend to AI-assisted Halal compliance workflows across ASEAN and Middle East and North Africa (MENA), regions connected by significant food trade and Muslim consumer demand.

Any future system would similarly support recognised Halal certification authorities, qualified auditors and human decision-makers. 

“We want to help small producers navigate compliance more efficiently and reduce friction between creating a product and reaching a market.” Chen said. “The most interesting technologies scale globally because the underlying problem is widespread and travels.”

Building an Asia–Gulf Technology Corridor
Food compliance forms part of Smobler’s wider move toward applied AI and digital infrastructure built around specific industry workflows.

The company is also developing Forage AI, focused on business-to-business food trade through AI-enabled workflows, verified networks and embedded financial infrastructure. Smobler is also exploring blockchain-enabled maritime infrastructure for bunkering, documentation and transactions.

Saudi Arabia’s investment in AI, logistics and digital infrastructure makes the Gulf particularly relevant to this strategy.

Smobler sees broader opportunity connecting Southeast Asia and the Gulf: adapting technologies and operating knowledge between markets rather than simply exporting software from one region to another.

“The Middle East opportunity isn’t interesting simply because AI investment is booming,” Chen said. “There are real problems at the intersection of food, trade, logistics and technology where our Asia-Pacific experience may be useful and we have to learn from regional partners.”

For Pax, the opportunity lies beyond AI demonstrations.

“Everyone can build an AI demo now,” Pax said. “The difficult part starts afterwards. Can the system be trusted? Is it economical to operate? Does it integrate into the industry? That last mile between an impressive prototype and reliable infrastructure is where we spend much of our time.”

Smobler at LEAP 2026
Smobler is seeking pilot, technology and commercial partners across food technology and trade, AI infrastructure and enterprise automation, logistics and maritime technology, as well as investment and innovation ecosystems. 

Organisations interested in meeting Mridhul Pax in Riyadh or discussing a potential pilot can contact [email protected].

About Smobler

Smobler is a Singapore-founded applied AI and frontier technology company turning emerging technology into real-world operating advantage. Its work spans food systems, enterprise operations and digital trade, including Robin AI, food-trade technology, enterprise AI applications and blockchain-enabled maritime solutions.

Smobler participates in the Meta Llama APAC Incubator and NVIDIA Inception technology ecosystems and works across Singapore, Asia-Pacific and the United States. 

Intelligence, applied.

For media & partnership enquiries, please email [email protected] or log onto www.smobler.io

Contact:
Loretta Chen
[email protected]
808 990 8300

SOURCE Smobler

Transit-Adjacent Mid-Rise Apartments Part of Master Planned Mixed-Use Community

CHEVY CHASE, Md., Aug. 31, 2026 — FCP_® announces a $22 million preferred equity investment through its Structured Investments platform to support the development of a 305-unit, seven-story apartment community adjacent to the West Falls Church Metro Station in Falls Church, VA. FCP is partnering on the investment with Rushmark Properties, a highly respected multifamily developer in the Greater Washington, DC area and throughout the Southeast.

The community is exceptionally well-located in Falls Church, with a top-rated school district, immediate access to retail shopping, grocery stores, and restaurants along the vibrant Broad Street corridor. The project is a part of a 42-acre coordinated development effort across two jurisdictions to create a vibrant mixed-use community composed of retail, commercial office, apartments, senior living, and for-sale residences. The Metro location affords rapid car-free access to regional job centers in Arlington, Tysons Corner, the Dulles Corridor, and Washington, DC.

“FCP is excited to work alongside Rushmark, a highly respected developer and property owner in the DC region,” said Billy Herbert, a Senior Vice President within FCP’s multifamily development team. “This Falls Church transit-oriented community reflects our investment strategy, with a well-positioned, quality product developed under the direction of a highly successful development team and best-in-class general contractor in HITT.”

The investment in the Rushmark development reflects FCP’s continued interest in Washington, DC area multifamily assets and underscores its ability to provide flexible capital solutions to experienced owners and developers navigating today’s challenging environment. This is the second preferred equity investment announced by FCP in the past 60 days, quickly following its investment at Aventon Wesley Chapel in Florida.

FCP extends its appreciation to Patrick McGlohn, Brian Gould, Brian Crivella and Pat Cunningham of Berkadia for their representation of the developer.

About FCP

FCP_®, a subsidiary of Federated Hermes, Inc., is a real estate investment company that has invested in or financed more than $14.8 billion in gross asset value since its founding in 1999. FCP invests directly and with operating partners in commercial and residential assets. The firm makes equity and structured investments in income-producing and development properties. Based in Chevy Chase, MD, FCP invests both its commingled, discretionary funds and separate accounts targeted at major real estate markets in the United States. For further information on FCP, please visit https://fcpdc.com.

SOURCE FCP

ESPOO, Finland, Aug. 31, 2026 — The new Finnish startup is disrupting the ways of controlling large-scale quantum computers by delivering a completely new class of electronic devices – superconducting transistors. These novel devices combine the computational power of transistors with the ultra-low power dissipation of superconductors. S-Transistors is developing first-of-its-kind quantum motherboards that will provide energy- and cost-efficient orchestration of cryogenic quantum computers at scale.

Newly launched Finnish startup S-Transistors, originating from VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, has raised €2.6 million in pre-seed funding to pioneer a fundamentally new class of integrated circuits based on superconducting transistors. The technology has several promising applications, from energy-efficient classical computing to spacecraft electronics, but quantum computing, in particular, stands to benefit most.

Today’s cryogenically cooled superconducting quantum computers need a paradigm-changing solution to break the scaling limit of the quantum processing unit (QPU) – the array of quantum bits that, by analogy to a conventional CPU, does the quantum computing. That limit comes from the power-hungry, poorly scalable way quantum processors are controlled today: multiple expensive, bulky cables per qubit, running from the processor inside the cryostat out to room-temperature electronics. This is exactly where S-Transistors’ superconducting transistor technology, which is already available at wafer scale, offers a solution that is radically more energy-efficient and compact than existing alternatives.

The funding round was led by Lifeline Ventures, a leading Nordic investor, and joined by an angel investor. S-Transistors is going to use the pre-seed funding to develop several product prototypes for cryogenic signal control and handling, set up its own cryogenic laboratory, establish a manufacturing pilot line for its unique integrated circuits based on superconducting transistors, and grow the team.

“Today’s efforts in scaling cryogenic quantum computers have delivered tremendous progress, with several practical use cases already demonstrated. However, further scaling is approaching a hard wall, as it still relies on power-hungry room-temperature electronics and separate wiring for each quantum bit (qubit) – both used to operate the quantum computer and link it to the outside world. The clearest path forward, for superconducting quantum computers in particular, is to bring the classical control and interface hardware down into the cryostat, right next to the quantum chip kept cold to protect its fragile quantum states. The catch is that such integration is extremely demanding in power dissipation, speed, and energy efficiency,” says Dr. Heorhii Bohuslavskyi, Co-founder and CEO of S-Transistors. “Superconducting transistors are exactly that missing piece of hardware for large-scale, energy-efficient quantum computing.”

Cryogenic quantum computers, including those based on superconducting quantum bits, are considered among the most promising platforms for scaling quantum computing. Unlocking their full potential will require quantum machines with hundreds of thousands of qubits, along with new technologies capable of supporting such computing systems at that scale.

One key challenge is the electronics used to control the qubits and transmit signals to and from the quantum processor. Today, much of this equipment operates outside the cryogenic environment that hosts the quantum-processing chip. Moving it closer to the quantum processor and operating it at extremely low temperatures could significantly improve scalability.

However, this is not simply a matter of placing conventional chips in the cold. Although some industrial silicon transistors can operate at deep cryogenic temperatures, they struggle to combine the performance needed to control large numbers of qubits with extremely low power consumption. Excess heat can disrupt the cryogenic environment and interfere with the quantum processor’s fragile operations.

Superconducting transistors offer a promising solution to this very problem. They combine ultra-low power consumption and high-speed performance with compatibility with the quantum processor’s cryogenic environment.

“When you think about it, the transistor is the most mass-manufactured device in human history. By combining the transistor functionality, with its unparalleled computing potential, and the superconducting property of near-zero power dissipation in a single device, we can reach a completely new level of energy-efficient cryogenic computing. In the near term, this already solves the cryogenic signal routing and delivery problems the superconducting quantum computer, but the real vision is the quantum motherboard: a completely new platform for scaling quantum computers, operating at mK temperatures, and controlling the operation of qubit-based QPU,” says Dr. Andrey Generalov, Co-founder and CTO of S-Transistors.

S-Transistors’ first product is a superconducting-transistor-based multiplexer that plugs into existing cryogenic setups and speeds up the development and prototyping of various quantum devices. It will ship to early customers and strategic partners within the company’s first year of operation. The multiplexer is the first logical step toward the quantum motherboard and, according to prospective customers and collaborators, it addresses one of the most acute pain points in scaling today’s superconducting quantum computers.

The potential reaches well beyond quantum computing and sensing. First theorised in the 1980s, a scalable and reproducible superconducting transistor technology today has strong potential across classical and quantum computing, artificial intelligence and high-performance computing hardware, spacecraft electronics, and fundamental particle detectors. S-Transistors intends to be the one to take that first step from lab to fab, toward customer adoption of superconducting transistor technology.

“S-Transistors is one of those rare companies built around a genuinely new piece of fundamental technology that could become an enabling layer for an entire industry. As quantum computers scale from hundreds or thousands of qubits toward commercially useful machines, we believe superconducting transistors can become a critical part of the hardware stack that makes that scaling possible,” says Jyri Engeström, Partner at Lifeline Ventures.

“Our strategy at VTT is to shorten the journey from idea to pilot, from pilot to commercial solution. We will continue to be a part of S-Transistors’ journey as the company approaches the manufacturing phase. S-Transistors’ superconducting transistor technology will allow us to reach the point where quantum computers finally provide real-world value,” says Erja Turunen, Executive Vice President at VTT.

MEDIA MATERIAL: https://vtt.contenthub.fi/ui/shares/w20275311/7GpG281ad1/en/

For additional information:
S-Transistors
Heorhii Bohuslavskyi, Co-founder and CEO of S-Transistors
[email protected]

VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland
Eija Tuominen, Research Team Leader
[email protected], tel. +358 503 296 207

S-Transistors

S-Transistors is pioneering a new class of transistors for scalable, energy-efficient classical and quantum computing. The company combines patent-pending fabrication and early-product circuit architectures with 50+ years of combined experience across microelectronics, cryogenics, quantum electronics, and advanced manufacturing. Guided by the pain points of academics and industry quantum computing players from Europe to North America and Asia, S-Transistors is on a quest to build the world’s first quantum motherboard – and unblock the scaling of quantum computers into the quantum-utility era.

https://s-transistors.com, LinkedIn

Further information on VTT:
Paula Bergqvist, Communications Manager
+358 20 722 5161, [email protected]
www.vttresearch.com

This information was brought to you by Cision http://news.cision.com

https://news.cision.com/vtt-info/r/s-transistors-raises–2-6-million-pre-seed-round-to-introduce-a-unique-superconducting-transistor-pl,c4388950

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NEW YORK, Aug. 28, 2026 — De¹, the team building a Financial World Model grounded in live market execution, has received investment from YZi Labs. The investment marks the start of De¹’s push to establish an agentic onchain future within the BNB Chain ecosystem, with both sides aiming to define how intelligence should interact with, learn from, and operate within live markets.

De¹ is building the Financial World Model, an intelligence layer trained directly on live markets. De¹ connects 1,000+ liquidity sources across 40+ chains through a unified execution layer, continuously labeling trading outcomes and feeding them back into the Financial World Model so execution quality and market understanding improve together. Built on shared market physics, the model can be specialized across perpetuals, prediction markets, tokenized assets, and other financial environments, while participants’ signals are recorded as measurable contributions to the intelligence they help build.

A broader shift is taking shape across Binance and BNB Chain ecosystem. BNB Chain is seeing the expansion of tokenized equities such as bStocks, while Binance has launched Agent OS to give AI applications access to market data, account functions, and trading infrastructure. Together, these developments point toward a market where more assets are becoming programmable and more agents are gaining the ability to act. Next challenge is building intelligence that can understand and adapt to real market behavior.

As these trends converge, De¹ is positioning its Financial World Model as an intelligence layer for BNB Chain’s next phase of growth. With bStocks expanding programmable assets and Agent OS opening financial infrastructure to AI, De¹ can turn live execution into continuous learning, helping agents move from simple execution to real-time adaptation. The investment from YZi Labs marks De¹’s entry into BNB Chain ecosystem, laying the foundation for AI-native financial applications built on live market intelligence.

De¹ has also indicated that further details will be released through its official channels on how users can participate in the Financial World Model and become part of its contributor ownership framework.

About De¹

De¹ is the intelligent infrastructure platform at the intersection of DeFi and AI, building the Financial World Model grounded in live execution and real market feedback. It serves developers, traders, institutions, and AI agents through intelligent execution, unified liquidity, reinforcement learning optimization, and a continuously evolving data flywheel.

[email protected]

SOURCE De¹