Wellington Management-Led Round Brings Encord’s Total Funding to $110M as Company Sees Physical AI Revenue Grow 10x in Last Twelve Months
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 26, 2026 — Encord, the data infrastructure company for physical AI, today announced a $60 million Series C led by Wellington Management, bringing the company’s total funding to $110 million. Existing investors Y Combinator, CRV, N47, Crane Venture Partners and Harpoon Ventures also participated in the round alongside new investors Bright Pixel Capital and Isomer Capital.
The investment will help Encord scale its AI-native data infrastructure platform, which helps AI teams manage, curate, annotate, and align the multimodal data that physical AI systems depend on, including audio, video, images, sensor data, 3D point clouds and other formats that legacy data platforms weren’t built to handle.
Encord works with over 300 AI teams globally, including Woven by Toyota, Zipline, Skydio, AXA Financial and numerous physical AI and frontier labs. The company has seen significant growth in both revenue and data volume on its platform in the last twelve months as a result of the surge in physical AI.
The Inflection Point in Physical AI
Encord’s Series C comes as physical AI – which powers robots, autonomous vehicles, drones, and other systems that operate in the real world – enters an explosive new growth stage. After years of lab demos and pilot programs, these systems are moving into production. Analysts project that over 400 million AI robots will come online in just the next 4 years, and that the size of the physical AI industry will eclipse $30B over the same time period.
Unlike large language models, which were trained on the open internet, physical AI models must learn from proprietary data, including sensor feeds, video, robotic telemetry, edge cases captured in the field and other sources. Storing and processing this data requires more computational power than storing and processing text.
That data doesn’t organize itself. Getting the right data into the models and keeping the wrong data out—continuously, at scale—requires purpose-built AI-native data infrastructure.
“Everyone is focused on building bigger models,” said Ulrik Stig Hansen, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Encord. “But for physical AI, the bottleneck isn’t model size. It’s data readiness. You can have the most sophisticated model in the world, and it will still fail if the data feeding it is incomplete, inconsistent, or misaligned with real-world conditions. That’s the problem we solve.”
Encord has seen demand surge as physical AI moves from experimentation to deployment:
Data on the company’s platform has grown from 1 petabyte to over 5 petabytes in twelve months—3x more than the data used to train GPT-4
Revenue from physical AI customers has grown 10x over the same period
Encord’s physical AI platform allows leading AI companies and teams to capture, organize and redeploy data across the model lifecycle. From facilitating data generation in the pre-training phase to aligning models in accordance with human feedback, Encord’s software is designed to handle every data automation and processing task physical AI companies may encounter.
Bill Tinney, Senior Director of AI Product Management and Partnerships at Vantor, an Encord customer, said, “At Vantor, we build AI for critical infrastructure and national security – we needed a data platform that could match our ambitions. Encord gives us a unified data layer that scales with the complexity of our geospatial workflows, from curation to annotation to evaluation, without tool fragmentation. For production AI teams, how you operationalize your data is a core competitive advantage.”
Eric Landau, Co-Founder and Co-CEO of Encord, said the funding will accelerate product development and expansion into new markets. “The companies winning in physical AI understand something that others are just beginning to realize: the model is only as good as the data behind it. We’re building the infrastructure that makes that data usable—not just once, but continuously, as these systems learn and improve in the real world.”
About Encord
Encord is the universal data layer for AI. The platform helps AI teams train and run their models with the right data – managing, curating, annotating, and aligning data across the full AI lifecycle. Encord works with over 300 leading AI teams, including Woven by Toyota, Zipline, AXA, and Skydio.
Media Contact: Chris Clemens Nexios Communications Strategies [email protected]
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 26, 2026 — Following its $100 million raise last September, VITURE has officially closed another $100 million financing round, bringing total capital raised within six months to over $200 million.
The latest round is led by Legend Capital, the investment arm affiliated with Lenovo, alongside a group of prominent strategic investors from the global technology ecosystem, including several prestigious investors from the previous round, such as Bertelsmann Group.
$200M in funding underscores strong investor confidence in VITURE’s XR and AR leadership as the company accelerates into 2026.
This new infusion of capital further strengthens investor confidence in VITURE’s leadership position within XR and AR hardware innovation, reinforcing strong momentum heading into 2026.
A Breakout Year for XR
2025 marked a defining year for VITURE’s evolution from a fast-growing startup into a dominant player in the XR industry.
In the second half of the year alone, VITURE launched its third-generation lineup — the Luma Series, representing its first major step into true AR experiences with Luma Ultra, alongside significant XR performance advances with its flagship model, The Beast.
The company also expanded retail presence across North America, including in-store placements at Best Buy with a first-of-its-kind walk-up XR demo experience.
According to IDC’s most recent quarterly reports, VITURE once again ranked #1 in XR glasses shipments in the United States, capturing the majority share of the extended-display category.
The long-awaited launch of The Beast in late 2025 marked a technological milestone, featuring an upgraded optical architecture and next-generation display system that will serve as a cornerstone of VITURE’s 2026 roadmap.
Cultural Momentum: Cyberpunk Collaboration
In December, VITURE partnered with CD Projekt RED to release a serialized limited-edition XR collaboration celebrating the fifth anniversary of Cyberpunk 2077.
The limited run of Luma Cyber XR Glasses quickly sold out, further strengthening VITURE’s cultural footprint within gaming and immersive entertainment communities. A wearable collectible. A display masterpiece. A slice of Night City — made real.
Strategic AI + AR Collaboration with NVIDIA & Stanford
Beyond consumer hardware, VITURE is also expanding into enterprise and medical applications.
The collaboration was briefly featured in Jensen Huang’s keynote last October — a moment that VITURE considers a meaningful milestone, standing alongside innovations shaping the future of technology. The initiative will also be showcased at the upcoming NVIDIA GTC, further positioning VITURE at the intersection of spatial computing and artificial intelligence.
Official Statement Regarding XREAL Litigation
As an official response to XREAL’s litigation, VITURE confirms that it has already taken affirmative legal action to protect its rights. This includes initiating patent infringement proceedings against XREAL in China, as well as separate legal action addressing false and harmful statements made by XREAL concerning VITURE and its products.
While VITURE did not seek to be drawn into litigation, the company will not hesitate to enforce its intellectual property rights and pursue all appropriate legal remedies available under applicable law.
If the court rules in VITURE’s favor, potential remedies may include injunctive relief restricting the manufacturing and export of all XREAL products utilizing the electrochromic film technology, along with other corrective measures as permitted by law.
With respect to the patent infringement claims recently brought by XREAL in the United States, VITURE has retained Cooley LLP, a leading international litigation firm, as counsel. VITURE’s official position is as follows:
We believe the claims lack merit. VITURE has independently developed its products and respects valid intellectual property rights. We will address these matters through the appropriate legal process while remaining focused on delivering innovative products and serving our customers.
VITURE stands confident in its technology, its intellectual property portfolio, and its long-term vision for advancing the XR industry.
Eyes on 2026
With exponential year-over-year growth and strong institutional backing, VITURE enters 2026 positioned not only as a leading XR hardware company, but as a broader spatial computing platform shaping the future of work, entertainment, and AI integration.
The newly secured funding will accelerate next-generation product development, global expansion, and deeper strategic collaborations across the XR ecosystem. It will also support the launch of the new product line, VITURE’s next evolution in intelligent spatial experiences, ushering in a new category of connected lifestyle technology.
As spatial computing moves from niche to mainstream, VITURE is positioned at the forefront — redefining how people see, interact with, and experience digital worlds in everyday life.
About VITURE
VITURE is a global pioneer in the XR industry, redefining immersive experiences and next-generation digital consumption through advanced display technology, refined industrial design, and user-centric innovation. According to IDC, VITURE has captured more than 50 percent of the U.S. extended reality glasses market since Q4 2024, establishing itself as a category benchmark and a leader in the evolution of wearable XR.
NASHVILLE, Tenn., Feb. 26, 2026 — Honest Health today announced a $140 million capital raise, led by NewSpring Healthcare, a sector-focused strategy of NewSpring dedicated to partnering with innovative healthcare companies. The investment reflects growing demand for Honest Health’s health system-focused approach and its track record of helping organizations execute successfully in value-based payment models.
Honest Health partners with health systems and providers to succeed in value-based, risk models through technology-enabled care coordination, quality improvement, and actionable insights. The raise is supported by K2 HealthVentures and a strong syndicate of Honest Health’s existing investors and institutional partners, including Rubicon Founders, Oak HC/FT, Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe (WCAS), and Durable Capital Partners.
Proceeds from the investment will support continued growth, including expansion into new markets and partnerships with health systems, provider organizations, and payers.
NewSpring Healthcare brings sector-specific knowledge and executive operating experience to help healthcare services companies achieve their vision. The team works closely with founders and CEOs to navigate growth, identify inflection points, and guide critical financial and operational decisions.
“Value-based care continues to reshape the healthcare landscape, creating significant demand for partners that can support execution at scale,” said Mike Kaplan, NewSpring Partner and board member of Honest Health. “Honest Health has demonstrated a strong ability to help health systems navigate this transition, and we see substantial opportunity to expand the company’s reach. With our deep healthcare operating experience, we’re excited to partner with Honest Health to support continued adoption of value-based care and the company’s next phase of growth.”
“Health systems and providers face growing demands to improve outcomes and manage costs, accelerating the need for value-based care models anchored in strong clinical leadership, proven processes, and scalable infrastructure,” said Rob Bessler, M.D., chief executive officer of Honest Health.
Honest Health is led by an experienced management team with deep clinical and operational expertise. CEO Rob Bessler, M.D., is a physician leader and entrepreneur who founded Sound Physicians and built it into a multibillion-dollar organization with significant impact across 42 states. Honest Health was founded in 2021 by Adam Boehler, Abe Sutton, and Matt Kim of Rubicon Founders, a healthcare investment firm. Adam Boehler was the former director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, a role which Abe Sutton currently leads.
“Honest Health was created with the conviction that real transformation in healthcare only happens when providers have the tools, accountability and support to focus on value over volume,” said Matt Kim, partner at Rubicon Founders. “In a short period of time, the company has demonstrated that belief in action, delivering measurable improvements in patient outcomes, strengthening operational performance and building a more sustainable path forward for providers. We’re proud of what the team has built and excited to continue building alongside them and NewSpring as Honest Health enters its next phase of growth.”
Supported by NewSpring Healthcare and participating investors, Honest Health is well positioned to broaden its national footprint and deliver measurable performance in increasingly complex risk environments.
Leerink Partners served as exclusive financial advisor, and Ropes & Gray served as legal counsel to Honest Health in connection with the transaction.
About Honest Health
Honest Health is a physician-led, value-based care enablement organization that partners with health systems and providers to drive improved patient outcomes while reducing costs. Honest supports clinicians by offering actionable insights, operational expertise, and shared accountability in care models that prioritize quality and value. For more information, visit honesthealth.com.
About NewSpring
For more than 25 years, NewSpring Capital has worked alongside founders and management teams in the lower-middle market, providing capital, operational support, and strategic guidance to help businesses scale. With over $3.5 billion in assets under management and more than 250 investments completed, we bring operational experience and investment expertise to build market-leading companies across sectors such as technology, healthcare, business services, consumer, and industrials. Through five distinct strategies covering the spectrum from growth equity and control buyouts to mezzanine debt, we tailor our approach to each company’s stage and goals, always with a focus on sustainable growth. As specialists in the lower-middle market, we support growth that leads to more predictable outcomes. At NewSpring, we are as invested in your outcome as you are. For more information, visit newspringcapital.com.
About Rubicon Founders
Rubicon Founders is an entrepreneurial healthcare investment firm focused on building and growing transformational companies that create enduring value by transforming the way people receive care. Rubicon Founders brings together a core team of investment, operating, and technology professionals who work to put patients and doctors first.
NODA AI’s Series A funding will accelerate progress of key DoW customer milestones for the orchestration of cross-vendor, mixed fleet autonomous systems
AUSTIN, Texas, Feb. 26, 2026 — NODA AI Inc., developer of the novel algorithmic weapons and tactics orchestration platform for all-domain, cross-vendor systems, today announced that it has raised $25 million in Series A funding, led by Bessemer Venture Partners with participation from Booz Allen Ventures, Draper Associates, Bloomberg Beta, and Alumni Ventures.
The investment will allow NODA AI to accelerate delivery on key milestones to Department of War and United Kingdom Ministry of Defense customers, deepen its integration across more than 30 existing platforms, and extend its technical capabilities into new defense and intelligence markets.
“Mass autonomy in defense demands a new generation of algorithmic warfare – a new market category and technical approach that we are pioneering at NODA AI,” said Philong Duong, Chief Executive Officer. “The essence of defeating adversaries is making better, faster decisions, and the next frontier will be the ability to harmonize decision making across an ecosystem of independent autonomous systems with diverse capabilities. While much of the defense industrial base is focused on building the best vehicles and their respective platform autonomies, functionally the chess pieces, we are ruthlessly focused on creating the brains, the best chess player — a system capable of adaptive reasoning, real-time tactics and strategy handling, and the ability to transform a set of independent capabilities into desired effects.”
NODA AI was founded in 2024 by Global War on Terrorism veterans to address the problem that the current control systems for unmanned technologies are fragmented, vendor-siloed, and overly deterministic — creating operational siloes and excessive cognitive load for the warfighter. To address this problem, the company is building a novel open and vendor-agnostic reasoning platform architected to design, develop, and deploy algorithmic warfare across manned and unmanned systems.
As an independent cognitive layer, NODA AI works with OEMs to understand and integrate different vehicles and autonomous capabilities into their growing 30+ OEM ecosystem. NODA AI also works with government partners to develop cross-platform tactics and strategies, leveraging its novel AI-reasoning engine to orchestrate those tactics across large, mixed fleets and transform today’s siloed platforms into combined and decisive combat power.
The platform is already in demand by defense and intelligence officials: its selection over several large incumbents in key programs and its demonstrated ability to integrate rapidly with other vendors have drawn strong endorsements from government leaders.
“NODA AI has been selected to lead the development of the orchestration layer for our multi-domain collaborative autonomy program. Their work is vital to advancing the Department’s autonomous force structure and directly supports the Secretary of War’s priorities,” a senior DoW official stated. “Their advanced AI orchestration technologies enable seamless coordination across unmanned and manned systems spanning air, space, surface, subsurface, and ground domains, making them pivotal to achieving operational superiority.”
In just nine months from pre-seed funding, NODA AI has created the largest technically integrated partner system in defense autonomy and has received multiple awards with major defense programs. It has partnered with several large defense primes, like Booz Allen Hamilton and Huntington Ingalls Industries, to accelerate development.
“NODA AI is building the AI-native connective tissue for defense autonomy, enabling collaboration and interoperability between systems, and we’re proud to partner with their team as they define the future of algorithmic warfare.” said Janelle Teng Wade, Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners. “We’re impressed by their technical depth, speed of execution, and mission-driven focus to deliver real operational advantage,” Dr. Ray O. Johnson, Operating Partner at Bessemer Venture Partners, added.
“NODA AI has been the fastest growing company in our portfolio and is onto something big,” said Paige Craig, Managing Partner of Outlander, who led early investments in notable defense companies like Scale AI and Havoc AI.
About NODA AI
NODA AI is an AI-native defense company focused on developing, maintaining, and orchestrating mixed-fleet tactics and strategies for autonomous systems.
The introduction of novel autonomy brings a new generation of algorithmic warfare, and NODA is building the world’s deepest vendor-agnostic, cross-platform algorithm repository so that operators can manage desired effects and not individual systems. https://www.NodaIntelligence.ai.
About Bessemer Venture Partners
Bessemer Venture Partners helps entrepreneurs lay strong foundations to build and forge long-standing companies. With more than 150 IPOs and 420 portfolio companies in the enterprise, consumer and healthcare spaces, Bessemer supports founders and CEOs from their earliest days through every stage of growth. Bessemer’s global portfolio has included Pinterest, Shopify, Twilio, Yelp, LinkedIn, PagerDuty, RocketLab, Wix, Fiverr, Toast and ServiceTitan, and the firm has $19 billion of assets under management. Bessemer has investment teams located in San Francisco, Silicon Valley, New York, Boston, London, Bangalore, and Tel Aviv. Born from innovations in steel more than a century ago, Bessemer’s storied history has afforded its partners the opportunity to celebrate and scrutinize its best investment decisions (see Memos) and also learn from its mistakes (see Anti-Portfolio).
Strategic Investment by Springcoast Partners Will Drive Product Innovation and Global Expansion
HOBART, Australia and MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Feb. 26, 2026 — UpGuard, a leader in cybersecurity and risk management, today announced it has raised a Series C funding round of $75M from Springcoast Partners. The minority funding round will accelerate UpGuard’s next growth phase, including the expansion of its AI-powered Cyber Risk Posture Management (CRPM) platform capabilities, scaling global go-to-market functions, and pursuing strategic M&A. Springcoast led the round and joins existing investors, August Capital, Square Peg Capital, and Pelion Venture Partners.
“UpGuard has an opportunity to bridge the gap between risk and security, and this Series C round adds even more fuel to accelerate the delivery of our enterprise-grade solutions for the mid-market. This ensures that CISOs and lean security teams can stay resilient with best-in-class tools to address today’s increasingly complex threat landscape,” said UpGuard’s co-founder and CEO Mike Baukes.
Today, UpGuard is trusted by 50k organizations in 90+ countries, including over 2000 customers who are supported by UpGuard’s distributed workforce across 14 countries with localized support and diverse expertise. Backed by customer validation, UpGuard has been named a winner in the G2 2026 Best Software Awards, ranking in the top 15 companies for Security, and in the top 100 of all Global Software Companies. This recognition reinforces UpGuard’s position as the category leader on G2 for Third-Party and Supplier Risk Management for 15 consecutive quarters, with a platform that processes more than 100 billion risk signals every day.
UpGuard’s AI-powered CRPM platform unifies the fragmented cybersecurity landscape by correlating risk across typically overlooked posture areas, including: Vendor Risk for the supply chain, Breach Risk for the external attack surface, User Risk for workforce security, Trust Exchange for data sharing, and Risk Automations for GRC engineering.
UpGuard is redefining security operations by shifting the burden from manual review to AI-driven automated precision. In the last 100 days alone, the platform processed over 23 billion tokens to power risk assessments, threat signals, and security questionnaire completions. This massive computational scale has translated into tangible speed for customers: to date, more than 70k AI risk assessments and 700k AI autofill questionnaires have been completed, and UpGuard’s AI Threat Analyst has been used to successfully triage 90 percent of over 483k breach signals to ensure security teams can focus on high-intent threats.
“UpGuard has proven its ability to execute and achieve significant scale and capital efficiency in a critical market, and they have the vision and technology to achieve even more. We are excited to partner with the UpGuard team as they expand their AI-CRPM platform capabilities and solidify their position as a leader in cyber risk posture management,” said Holger Staude, Managing Partner at Springcoast.
BofA Securities acted as the exclusive placement agent to UpGuard on the transaction, and Fenwick provided legal counsel.
About UpGuard Founded in 2012, UpGuard is a leader in cybersecurity and risk management. The company’s AI-powered platform for Cyber Risk Posture Management (CRPM) provides a centralized, actionable view of cyber risk across an organization’s vendors, attack surface, and workforce. Trusted by thousands of companies, UpGuard’s platform is designed to help security teams manage cyber risk with confidence and efficiency. UpGuard is headquartered in Hobart, Tasmania with US headquarters in Mountain View, California. To learn more, visit www.upguard.com.
About Springcoast Partners Established in 2023, Springcoast is a New York-based growth equity firm focused on partnering with market leading software and technology companies. To learn more about Springcoast, visit www.springcoast.com.
New funding led by DeepWork Capital, with significant investment from Data Point Capital, and with participation from existing investors, will accelerate product development and market expansion
MIAMI, Feb. 26, 2026 — FirmPilot, the AI-powered legal marketing platform, today announced the close of its oversubscribed Series A-1 funding round. The round was led by DeepWork Capital, with a significant investment from Data Point Capital, and participation from existing investors including Blumberg Capital, Thomson Reuters Ventures, Valor Ventures, SaaS Ventures, and EarlyLight Ventures. The new capital brings FirmPilot’s total funding to $27.25M. As part of the investment, DeepWork Capital Partner Ken Hall will join FirmPilot’s Board of Directors.
Every hour, more than 1,000 people in the U.S. search online for legal help, yet 75% never scroll past the first page of results. For the 425,000+ law firms in the U.S., legacy approaches to marketing, retaining traditional agencies, manually managing ad spend, and relying on guesswork are costly, low-ROI, and not built for busy legal professionals. FirmPilot’s patent-pending AI Legal Marketing Engine replaces this guesswork with intelligence, using proprietary data and AI to help law firms attract higher-value clients, faster.
Since its founding in 2023, FirmPilot has experienced rapid growth. The company’s platform has generated tens of thousands of qualified leads for law firms across the U.S., with clients seeing 180%+ increases in case volume. FirmPilot’s AI knowledge model has analyzed more than 5 million pieces of legal marketing content and draws from a proprietary database of 3,000+ relevant legal cases to produce authoritative content that ranks in both traditional search and AI-driven search engines, including results surfaced by ChatGPT.
“Law firm owners aren’t just practicing law anymore, they’re building companies. And the firms that will win over the next decade are the ones making the shift from gut-feeling marketing to data-driven, AI-powered growth. This round gives us the fuel to help more firms make that transition and to continue building the platform that replaces the traditional agency model entirely.”
— Jake Soffer, Founder & CEO, FirmPilot
FirmPilot’s platform provides an all-in-one solution for law firm marketing, including AI-driven SEO and GEO (AI search optimization), PPC and Google Ads management, local SEO, digital PR and link building, social media, and website optimization. The platform’s competitive blueprinting technology takes an “x-ray” of a firm’s competitive landscape, analyzing trends and patterns in SEO, ads, and other digital marketing activity of competitors to identify growth opportunities. FirmPilot’s AI agent automation then handles time-intensive tasks, from 24/7 competitor monitoring to content calibration, while real-time dashboards give firm owners full transparency into ROI.
The new funding will fuel two major product initiatives. First, FirmPilot is building its next-generation AI model, 10x the size of its current model in terms of training data, expected to roll out to all clients by Q3 2026. The upgraded model will enable significantly deeper content creation, smarter marketing tactics, and faster time to ROI for law firms. Second, FirmPilot is developing direct integrations with leading case management solutions, allowing the platform to ingest case value data and use it to more intelligently direct marketing efforts through its AI marketing agents. These integrations will also unlock precise ROI attribution and revenue tracking, effectively creating a powerful revenue operations command center for law firms, connecting marketing spend directly to case outcomes for the first time.
“FirmPilot is solving a massive problem for a market that has been drastically underserved by technology. Jake and his team have built a product that delivers measurable, data-driven results for law firms, replacing an entire industry of manual marketing agencies with an intelligent platform. The combination of proprietary legal domain data, AI automation, and clear client ROI is exactly what we look for at DeepWork. We’re thrilled to lead this round and join the board as FirmPilot enters its next phase of growth.”
— Ken Hall, Partner, DeepWork Capital
“We’ve been tracking the legal marketing space closely, and FirmPilot stood out immediately. Jake and his team have built a genuinely differentiated platform, one that combines proprietary legal domain data with AI automation to deliver measurable client acquisition results. The opportunity to displace a fragmented, agency-driven market with an intelligent, scalable platform is exactly what we invest in at Data Point Capital. We’re excited to partner with this team.”
— Scott Savitz, Founder & Managing Partner, Data Point Capital
About FirmPilot
FirmPilot is the leader in AI legal marketing. FirmPilot’s patent-pending AI Legal Marketing Engine provides law firms and services-based SMBs with a modern way to grow with strategies built entirely on data and intelligence. The platform uses proprietary AI to analyze competitive landscapes, create authoritative content, optimize across SEO, GEO, PPC, social media, and local search, and deliver real-time ROI insights, replacing the guesswork of traditional marketing agencies. Founded in 2022 and headquartered in Miami, FirmPilot is backed by leading investors including DeepWork Capital, Data Point Capital, Blumberg Capital, Thomson Reuters Ventures, HubSpot Ventures, Valor Ventures, SaaS Ventures, EarlyLight Ventures, FJ Labs, and Connexa Capital. Learn more at firmpilot.com.
About DeepWork Capital
DeepWork Capital is an early-stage venture capital firm founded in 2015 in Orlando, Florida. The firm invests in tech-forward founders addressing the world’s biggest problems in the technology and life sciences sectors, with a focus on underserved venture capital markets. Learn more at deepworkcapital.com.
About Data Point Capital
Data Point Capital focuses on highly scalable, capital-efficient technology companies across consumer internet, cloud-based enterprise software, and AI. The firm is made up of business executives and internet leaders who have created over $50 billion in market value through companies they founded or ran. Notable portfolio companies include DraftKings (DKNG), Rent the Runway (RENT), and numerous successful exits. Learn more at datapointcapital.com.
Investment reinforces CerraCap Impact’s commitment to frontier defense technologies and next-generation quantum systems built for real-world deployment.
COSTA MESA, Calif. and SANTA FE, N.M., Feb. 26, 2026 — CerraCap Impact Venture Capital (CIVC) today announced its investment in Bandelier Technologies, a New Mexico-based deep-tech company developing memory-free quantum radar, sensing, and advanced metasurface antenna systems for national security, space-domain awareness, and resilient communications. The investment strengthens CIVC’s strategic focus on national security and advanced computing while expanding its portfolio of mission-critical dual-use technologies.
Bandelier Technologies
Bandelier is translating national-lab breakthroughs into fieldable systems designed for contested environments, where legacy platforms are often too heavy, too fragmented, or too detectable. The company’s quantum radar platform is built on photonic techniques developed at Los Alamos National Laboratory and is engineered for long-range, low-signature sensing and imaging without requiring quantum memory – an architectural advantage that supports scalability and deployment readiness. Bandelier also develops electronically steerable metasurface antennas for defense, aerospace, and next-generation communications applications.
Abhi Mukherjee, Partner at CerraCap Impact Venture Capital, said: “People often say they invest in the horse or the jockey. With Stephen, we saw the combination of both a founder with rare mission discipline and a platform built to matter. Before pursuing his MBA from Harvard Business School, Stephen spent ten years as a Green Beret in U.S. Army Special Forces and worked as a CPA earlier in his career. This pedigree gives Bandelier a uniquely strong bridge between technical rigor, operational credibility, and commercialization execution. That combination is exactly what is required to work effectively with the New Mexico national lab ecosystem and transition breakthrough quantum sensing into deployable defense and commercial systems. CerraCap Impact moved with conviction because this is the kind of company that can define a category.”
Stephen Buchanan, Founder and CEO of Bandelier Technologies, said: “When I first met Abhi, he told me CerraCap would be the first check in, and he delivered exactly as promised. That kind of conviction and follow-through matters, especially when you are building deep, physics-driven technology for national security. Our round was oversubscribed, and we intentionally chose CerraCap to help anchor it because they bring more than capital: they bring strategic reach, real commercialization muscle, and a long-term mindset for turning frontier science into mission-ready capability. CerraCap is the kind of partner we need for the road ahead.”
Bandelier has already built strong external validation. The company was selected for New Mexico LEEP Cohort 5, where fellows collaborate with Los Alamos scientists to advance national security innovations; LANL specifically identified Bandelier’s work as redefining long-range quantum sensing for defense, space, and secure communications. Bandelier has also been assessed “Awardable” in the DARPA ERIS Marketplace, a rapid acquisition pathway for government buyers, and was selected as a Prime awardee on the Missile Defense Agency’s SHIELD contract vehicle supporting the Golden Dome missile defense mission after previously advancing into SHIELD’s competitive range.
This investment reflects what makes CerraCap Impact distinctive: a venture platform purpose-built to accelerate enterprise and government adoption, combining CerraCap Venture’s Sales & Scale™ commercialization engine with Impact Venture Capital’s Corporate Intelligence Platform™ across customers, strategic investors, and acquirers. CIVC was formed in December 2025 to serve founders building in complex sectors, including national security and advanced computing, where execution advantage and ecosystem access are decisive.
About CerraCap Impact Venture Capital CerraCap Impact Venture Capital (CIVC) is a globally connected venture platform focused on mission-critical technologies, with a differentiated model designed to accelerate commercial validation, enterprise adoption, and strategic outcomes for founders and investors.
About Bandelier Technologies Bandelier Technologies is a New Mexico quantum technology company developing next-generation quantum radar, sensing, and meta-surface antenna systems for defense and commercial applications. The company’s mission is to bring national-lab science into field-ready systems that deliver resilient sensing, secure communications, and operational advantage in contested environments.
85% of Proficient First Graders Maintain Success Through Second Grade Without Further Support
Ignite Reading Launches “First Grade Promise” to Ensure Every Child Achieves Reading Proficiency in First Grade
OAKLAND, Calif., Feb. 26, 2026 — Ignite Reading, a Science of Reading-based early literacy intervention program that has provided more than 62 million minutes of personalized instruction to over 50,000 students nationwide, today announced the completion of a second study by researchers at the Center for Research and Reform in Education (CRRE) at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) School of Education, showing 85% of first graders who reached proficiency maintained grade-level reading a year later without further intervention.
Ignite Reading: JHU Year 2 Study Infographic
The findings of the two-year study, conducted across thirteen school districts in Massachusetts, confirmed the program’s ability to accelerate foundational reading skills during the crucial first grade window when students are best able to learn to read. According to the study, first graders reading at or above DIBELS benchmark increased from 6% at the beginning of the year to 48% at the end of the year with foundational reading skills tutoring. These compelling results confirm that Ignite Reading’s virtual, high-impact early literacy intervention model not only delivers exceptional outcomes but also achieves durable, lasting impact on foundational reading skills at scale, underscoring the success of and the importance of intervening decisively in the first grade.
Dr. Amanda Neitzel, lead researcher at Johns Hopkins’ University’s Center for Research and Reform in Education, commented, “These findings show that intervening to ensure students are reading on grade level by the end of first grade is highly effective and has promising implications for district planning and policy initiatives focused on improving third-grade reading outcomes. 85% of students who reached proficiency maintained it through second grade without further intervention. Taken together, these results demonstrate that accelerating early reading development in first grade through high-dosage, individualized tutoring can lead to both rapid and lasting improvements.”
Key Findings Underscore the Critical First Grade Window The JHU CRRE analysis of 1,596 first-grade students in Year 2 produced virtually identical results to the initial study, effectively moving the program from a ‘promising pilot’ to a proven, evidence-based solution with sustained efficacy and sustained high-impact results that are repeatable year over year.
Retained Literacy Gains: 85% of students who were on grade level at the end of first grade after participating in the Ignite Reading program maintained grade-level proficiency through second grade without further intervention, demonstrating the impact is lasting rather than temporary. In contrast, only 12% of students who were not on grade level at the end of first grade were able to catch up to grade level by the end of second grade without further intervention.
Accelerated Growth: Students achieved more than five months of additional learning—equivalent to 128 additional points of DIBELS growth (vs. 80 expected).
Increasing Efficacy: Students outperformed peers by a +0.23 SD effect size, a significant increase over Year 1 (+0.19 SD) and equivalent to in-person tutoring conducted at scale.
Substantial Progress: Over the course of the study, the share of students meeting reading benchmarks increased dramatically from 6% to 48%, while intensive intervention needs fell from 70% to 31%.The evaluation found that literacy gains were consistent across student populations.
The evaluation found that literacy gains were consistent across student populations:
Both English learners and non-English learners showed similar gains;
Students with disabilities demonstrated substantial gains;
No significant differential effects were found by race or ethnicity; and
High-attendance students showed the strongest effects (effect size of +0.28).
Jessica Reid Sliwerski, CEO and co-founder of Ignite Reading, highlighted the significance of the persistence analysis and the urgency of ensuring kids learn to read before the end of first grade, “We now have concrete evidence that first grade is the threshold for lifelong success. Seeing 85% of our proficient first graders maintain their gains into second grade without further support confirms that our model creates lasting, independent readers. The data also serves as a powerful wake-up call: with only 12% of students catching up if they miss that first-grade window, we must treat early intervention as the urgent, non-negotiable priority it is.”
First Grade Promise – Replication and Scalability The study reinforced the value of achieving reading proficiency in the first grade, a pivotal window where the right support ensures students become lifelong readers. Researchers noted that among students who did not reach proficiency by the end of the year, only 12 in 100 students caught up, underscoring the urgency of timely support. In years past, third grade has served as the primary accountability point for reading proficiency in state and federal policy, shaping assessment, promotion, and intervention practices nationwide. However, by the time reading failure appears in third grade outcomes, underlying skill gaps have typically been present for years, limiting the effectiveness and efficiency of intervention.
The First Grade Promise is grounded in learning science and evidence-based practice and is designed to shift literacy intervention earlier to the years when reading difficulty is still preventable. By ensuring that students master foundational reading skills and reach oral reading fluency by the end of first grade, states and districts can dramatically increase the share of students who become proficient readers. Research indicates that most children can learn to read on time when instruction is explicit, systematic, and sufficiently intensive, with additional targeted support provided to those who need it. Ignite Reading’s First Grade Promise is a collective commitment by district leaders, educators, and community members to intervene on time with precision, fidelity, and urgency.
Dr. Almudena (Almi) G. Abeyta, Superintendent of Chelsea Public Schools, said, “Ignite Reading is a transformative partner and a seamless extension of our team, providing the high-dosage resources we simply couldn’t scale on our own. In public education, personalized instruction is the key to equity, and seeing our students achieve such explosive growth is exhilarating. As educators, there is no greater relief than seeing the data prove these skills are taking hold; it means we are successfully seizing that critical first-grade window and providing the support our kids need to secure their future as lifelong readers.”
JHU CRRE conducts research to improve educational outcomes and inform evidence-based policy and practice. Its evaluation used a quasi-experimental design with propensity score matching to compare tutored students with similar non-participants. The study examined literacy outcomes using DIBELS standardized assessments and tracked benchmark status changes from the beginning to the end of first grade and through second grade for former participants. Furthermore, the study confirmed the program’s scalability across diverse environments, noting consistent implementation with an 85% average student attendance rate, 33 hours of instruction on average, and strong fidelity in real-world conditions. All student groups, including English Learners and students with disabilities, showed substantial and comparable growth.
The multi-year research initiative was made possible through a philanthropic grant and strategic coordination led by the Massachusetts-based One8 Foundation. Recognizing the urgent need for proven, scalable early literacy interventions, the One8 Foundation partnered with Ignite Reading to fund and project manage the initial pilot. This close collaboration and oversight were instrumental in ensuring high-quality implementation of the program throughout the schools.
About Ignite Reading Ignite Reading is the leading early literacy intervention company focused on accelerating foundational reading skills during the most critical window for reading success. Aligned with the Science of Reading, Ignite Reading delivers predictable early literacy gains, strengthens instructional readiness, and helps districts achieve measurable, defensible early reading outcomes that matter for students, educators, and leaders. For more information, please visit: https://ignite-reading.com/
About One8 Foundation The One8 Foundation education team identifies, supports, and scales high-impact applied learning programs that engage students actively in their learning and prepare them for success in a rapidly changing, data-rich world. One8 is committed to building a future where high-quality applied learning opportunities, oriented around STEM and 21st century skills, that make learning relevant, stimulating, and rewarding, are a regular part of the student experience, driving impact for all students. Between 2023-2025, One8 designed, funded and provided implementation support for 13 districts to work with Ignite Reading to tutor around 4,000 first-grade students not yet reading at grade level. To assess effectiveness of this initiative, One8 also funded a third-party evaluation with Johns Hopkins University, which concluded that students receiving high dosage tutoring experienced over 5 months of additional learning than students who did not receive the tutoring. In 2025, given this evidence of impact, the state of Massachusetts took over the operation of this program supported with public funding. Learn more at http://www.one8.org
About Johns Hopkins University Center for Research & Reform in Education The Center for Research and Reform in Education is a research center within the Johns Hopkins School of Education. Established in 2004, CRRE’s goal is to improve the quality of education for disadvantaged children in grades pre-K through 12 through dissemination of knowledge about effective approaches to school improvement and through high-quality research and program evaluation studies.
Fidelity Management & Research Company, Sumitomo Corporation of Americas, Pelican Energy Partners, Deerfield Management and Oaktree Capital Management participated in the Financing Round
JANESVILLE, Wis., Feb. 26, 2026 — SHINE Technologies, a nuclear fusion company, today announced it has raised $240 million in equity funding, and appointed Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, M.D., Executive Chairman of ImmunityBio and founder of NantWorks, to its Board of Directors. The round was led by NantWorks with additional participation from Fidelity Management & Research Company, Sumitomo Corporation of Americas, Pelican Energy Partners, Deerfield Management, Oaktree Capital Management, and other existing investors.
The investment advances SHINE’s commercial fusion technology across its current portfolio of products and services – providing neutron testing that qualifies mission-critical components for defense and aerospace and supplying radioisotopes that power targeted cancer therapies and diagnostic imaging. The funding also marks the beginning of the company’s next stage of growth – developing technology to recycle used nuclear fuel and building toward commercial fusion energy production.
“Fusion energy is one of the most important technologies humanity will ever develop — it will forever change how we power our species, and is already having major impact across advanced manufacturing, healthcare and recycling,” said Greg Piefer, founder and CEO of SHINE. “Dr. Soon-Shiong is a visionary who has spent his career turning breakthrough science into products that have made the world better. We are honored to have him as a partner.”
Dr. Soon-Shiong is a physician scientist, serial entrepreneur, and multi-sector investor who has built and sold two major pharmaceutical companies, founded the NantWorks ecosystem spanning healthcare, technology, and media. He has developed a multitude of FDA-approved therapies that have reached patients globally. Across all of it, his research has returned to the same challenge: how to transform cancer care and harness the immune system, and reduce the toxicities of standard high dose chemo-radiation therapy. That conviction aligns directly with where oncology is heading. Lu-177-based therapies deliver targeted radiation precisely to cancer cells, and researchers are actively studying how combining that approach with immune activation could produce more durable patient outcomes.
“This partnership is about harnessing powerful science to serve humanity. SHINE’s leadership in fusion technology and Lu-177 production aligns with my lifelong mission to make cancer treatment more precise, targeted, and ultimately curative by activating the patient’s immune system. Lu-177 is currently approved as a radio ligand targeting prostate cancer cells and the opportunity to further expand this difficult to manufacture technology is exciting. I’m honored to join SHINE’s Board as we translate breakthrough science into real-world impact for patients and society,” said Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, Founder and Executive Chairman of NantWorks and ImmunityBio.
In connection with Soon-Shiong’s $150 million investment, NantWorks and SHINE have entered a strategic partnership that includes priority access arrangements for Lu-177 supply from SHINE, positioning both organizations to advance the next generation of targeted cancer treatment.
SHINE has now raised more than $1 billion in total funding, reflecting sustained investor confidence in its commercially-driven path to fusion energy.
About SHINE Headquartered in Janesville, Wisconsin, SHINE is an industry leader in next-generation fusion, developing innovative fusion-based technology that combines safety, cost-efficiency and environmental responsibility.
SHINE has successfully commercialized fusion across multiple applications, including neutron testing markets such as neutron radiography, radiation-effects testing and fusion material research. It has commercialized and is scaling its proprietary medical isotope production and processes, supplying high-quality radioisotopes essential for procedures including diagnosing heart disease and cancer as well as cancer therapy.
SHINE currently operates one of the largest Lu-177 production facilities in North America, with capacity for up to 100,000 doses annually with the ability to scale to 200,000 doses per year. Ilumira has shipped to customers in 19 countries across four continents, achieving greater than 95% on-time, in-full delivery since its commercial launch in 2024.
Beyond these applications, SHINE is pioneering nuclear waste recycling to make nuclear energy more sustainable. Its long-term purpose is to change the way humans make energy by commercializing fusion energy. Unlike other fusion companies, SHINE takes a commercially driven path mirroring successful deep-tech industries. Through this visionary approach, SHINE is advancing technology, healthcare, and sustainable energy, making a lasting impact across multiple sectors.
