Aims to Raise Capital to Fund Global Clinical Studies for LNP7457 (PRMT5) & LNP8701 (SOS1)

MUMBAI, India and NAPLES, Fla., July 21, 2026 — Global pharmaceutical leader Lupin Limited (Lupin) (BSE: 500257) (NSE: LUPIN) (REUTERS: LUPIN.BO) (BLOOMBERG: LPCIN) today announced the strategic spin-out of two oncology programs – LNP7457 (PRMT5) and LNP8701 (SOS1), through its wholly owned subsidiary, Lupin Inc., into Kaveri Therapeutics Inc. (Kaveri), a U.S.-based clinical-stage oncology company. Kaveri will advance these programs through global clinical trials.

Under the terms of the agreement, Lupin Inc. will have a significant equity stake in Kaveri, provide seed funding, and grant them exclusive rights to the programs.

Kaveri will operate as an independent entity under the leadership of Chief Executive Officer Kristi Jones, a seasoned biopharmaceutical leader with a strong track record of building and advancing innovative companies, and Chief Medical Officer Dr. Robert Pierce, who brings deep clinical expertise and will lead the company’s clinical development strategy. 

Kaveri will seek to raise additional capital to fund its clinical development efforts. Notably, both programs have demonstrated encouraging clinical progress, with LNP7457 (PRMT5) and LNP8701 (SOS1) each reporting positive data at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting in 2025 and 2026, respectively.

“We are proud to have pioneered these oncology assets and look forward to advancing them through Kaveri Therapeutics,” said Vinita Gupta, Chief Executive Officer, Lupin. “The strength of these assets, combined with Kaveri’s seasoned leadership team, positions us to accelerate the development of targeted oncology therapies with the goal of bringing meaningful innovation to patients.”

About Lupin

Lupin Limited is a global pharmaceutical leader headquartered in Mumbai, India, with products distributed in over 100 markets. Lupin specializes in pharmaceutical products, including branded and generic formulations, complex generics, biotechnology products, and active pharmaceutical ingredients. Trusted by healthcare professionals and consumers globally, the company enjoys a strong position in India and the U.S. across multiple therapy areas, including respiratory, cardiovascular, anti-diabetic, anti-infective, gastrointestinal, central nervous system, and women’s health. Lupin has 15 state-of-the-art manufacturing sites and 7 research centers globally, along with a dedicated workforce of over 26,000 professionals. Lupin is committed to improving patient health outcomes through its subsidiaries – Lupin Diagnostics, Lupin Digital Health, and Lupin Manufacturing Solutions.

To learn more, visit www.lupin.com or follow us on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/lupin

About Kaveri Therapeutics

Kaveri Therapeutics, Inc. (Kaveri) is a clinical stage oncology company advancing differentiated small-molecule therapies for hard-to-treat cancers. The company’s pipeline includes programs targeting PRMT5 and SOS1/RAS-pathway biology, with an initial development focus in solid tumors including lung, pancreatic, ovarian, and CNS-relevant cancers. Kaveri is focused on biomarker-driven clinical development, regulatory execution, rational combination strategies, and advancing cancer therapeutics for patients with limited treatment options.

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2461104/5994298/Lupin_Logo.jpg

SOURCE Lupin Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Financing will support development of RN-014 and RN-032 and continued expansion of the company’s kidney disease pipeline

KYOTO, Japan, July 21, 2026 — Rege Nephro Co., Ltd. (“Rege Nephro”), a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on iPS cell-based kidney regenerative medicine and drug discovery, today announced the closing of a financing round totaling approximately US$10.6 million through the issuance of J-KISS (Japan-Keep It Simple Security) share acquisition rights. The proceeds are expected to support commercialization activities for RN-014, the company’s lead candidate for autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD), advance its iPS cell-derived regenerative medicine program RN-032, and fund continued research and development activities. The financing is intended to support the company’s growth through its anticipated Series C financing and beyond.

• Background of the Funding

Rege Nephro is dedicated to developing innovative therapies and medical technologies for patients with kidney diseases who currently have limited treatment options.

The company’s lead program, RN-014, recently reached LPLV (Last Patient Last Visit) in its Phase 2a clinical trial, marking an important milestone. RN-014 is a small-molecule therapeutic candidate identified through screening using an iPS cell-derived ADPKD disease model, and analysis of Phase 2a clinical trial data is currently underway.

In addition, RN-032, an iPS cell-derived regenerative medicine program based on renal nephron progenitor cells, has completed process development in preparation for nonclinical studies and is progressing to the next stage.

The financing will support continued advancement of these core programs while strengthening the company’s long-term growth strategy.

• Future Strategy and Use of Proceeds

The capital raised will be allocated across four key priorities:

1. RN-014 Commercialization and Global Licensing Activities

Building on insights generated from the Phase 2a clinical trial, Rege Nephro plans to pursue global licensing and partnering opportunities for RN-014 while continuing development activities aimed at further evaluating the program’s therapeutic potential.

2. Supporting Nonclinical Development of RN-032

Following the completion of process development for RN-032, the company will advance RN-032 into nonclinical studies to establish the foundation for future clinical trials.

3. Expanding Discovery Research and Kidney Regeneration Programs

The company will continue to invest in discovery and translational research, including next-generation kidney regeneration technologies and future pipeline candidates. Rege Nephro ultimately aims to develop therapies that improve outcomes and quality of life for patients with kidney disease while reducing progression to kidney failure.

4. Strengthening Organizational Capabilities

To support continued growth, Rege Nephro plans to expand its team by recruiting scientific, clinical development, and business development professionals with specialized expertise.

Through this financing, Rege Nephro seeks to advance its pipeline while strengthening the operational foundation required to support future growth and long-term value creation.

• List of the investors (In alphabetical order)

Arcus South East Asia
BA7 Venture Capital CORP
Chushin Venture Capital Co., Ltd.
DCI Partners Co., Ltd.
JAFCO Group Co., Ltd.
JIC Venture Growth Investments Co., Ltd.
Kyoshin Social Capital Co., Ltd.
Kyoto University Innovation Capital Co., Ltd.
Mitsubishi UFJ Capital Co., Ltd.
RAP-HI Co., Ltd.
SPARX Asset Management Co., Ltd.
TaiAn Technologies Corp.
TOHO HOLDINGS CO., LTD.

• Comment from Akifumi Morinaka, Representative Director and CEO of Rege Nephro:

“This funding round marks an important milestone as we advance RN-014 toward commercialization and accelerate development of RN-032,” said Akifumi Morinaka, Representative Director and CEO of Rege Nephro. “I would like to express my sincere gratitude to our investors for their support and confidence in our vision and progress. With RN-014 having completed its Phase 2a clinical trial and RN-032 advancing toward its next stage of development, we believe the company is well positioned for continued growth. We remain committed to addressing unmet medical needs in kidney disease through innovative medicines and regenerative therapies based on iPS cell technology.”

• About Rege Nephro Co., Ltd.

Rege Nephro Co., Ltd. is a clinical-stage biotechnology company that leverages scientific discoveries originating from the research of Professor Kenji Osafune at Kyoto University’s Center for iPS Cell Research and Application (CiRA).

The company is developing innovative therapies for kidney diseases based on iPS cell technology, with the goal of expanding treatment options for patients with serious and difficult-to-treat conditions.

URL: https://www.regenephro.co.jp/en

SOURCE Rege Nephro Co., Ltd.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

About Twenty

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

SOURCE Twenty

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

SOURCE Natural AI, Inc.

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

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

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

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

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

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

The recognition reflects Walthour’s continued work to:

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

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

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

About Blueprint Capital Advisors

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

SOURCE Blueprint Capital Advisors

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

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

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

Built From the Ground Up for Business Teams

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

Pricing and Availability

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

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

Media Contact
DocJuris Communications
[email protected]

SOURCE DocJuris, Inc.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

About Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group

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

SOURCE Raghu Vamsi Aerospace Group (RVAG)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

SOURCE Paine Schwartz Partners

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

About ApexData

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

Media Contact:
Andrei Surkov
+14083298998
[email protected]

SOURCE ApexData Inc