NEW YORK, April 24, 2025 — As the global investment landscape shifts in response to AI breakthroughs, geopolitical flux, and a generational wealth transfer, one firm is emerging as a powerful force redefining what it means to lead with conviction: Beyond Alpha Ventures (BAV). Under the visionary leadership of Jacob Kobe Frankel, BAV has established itself as a multi-strategy family office and hedge fund with an eye on the future—and the world is taking notice.

Launched with a long-term thesis and institutional discipline, BAV has quietly built a portfolio that reads like a blueprint of the next decade’s technological infrastructure. The firm holds stakes in industry-defining companies such as SpaceX, Palantir, and X.AI, placing it at the core of frontier innovation—from space commercialization and AI governance to national security technology and large language model development.

“We don’t just invest in companies—we invest in the architecture of tomorrow’s society,” says Frankel. “At BAV, capital is not just fuel. It’s strategy, insight, and commitment to long-term impact.”

A Visionary at the Helm

At just 32, Jacob Kobe Frankel has emerged as one of the most compelling young voices in venture capital and asset management. Frankel combines technical fluency with macroeconomic insight, bringing a rare dual-lens perspective to capital allocation. His strategic thinking has led to early and bold moves into sectors now considered essential.

What sets Frankel apart is not just his eye for high-growth assets—but his deep belief that venture capital has a responsibility beyond returns. Under his leadership, BAV has championed an investment model that actively integrates ethical foresight, systems thinking, and technical diligence. The result: a firm with both impressive returns and a growing reputation for shaping purposeful innovation.

A Distinct Investment Strategy

BAV’s edge lies in its multi-strategy approach, balancing late-stage private equity, secondary market opportunities, and algorithmic public market strategies. The firm operates with the agility of a startup and the rigor of an institutional fund, using proprietary AI-assisted research tools to enhance due diligence, monitor portfolio performance, and uncover high-potential market inefficiencies before they become mainstream.

Frankel’s belief in precision capital is evident in the firm’s track record. By backing technologies with proven traction and transformative potential, BAV has aligned itself with ventures that are not only scalable, but foundational—positioning itself as a core player in the next wave of technological consolidation.

A Global Perspective with Long-Term Discipline

Beyond Alpha Ventures has been featured in discussions at the Nasdaq Innovation Series, the Mastercard AI Summit, and global finance panels where Frankel has been praised for his pragmatic vision of AI’s role in society. Unlike many firms chasing hype cycles, BAV invests with a generational lens—focusing on technologies that can enhance resilience, transparency, and societal scalability.

“AI is no longer a vertical—it’s the operating system of modern civilization,” Frankel stated at a recent investor conference. “At BAV, our role is to back the builders of that system—with capital, conviction, and long-term partnership.”

Poised for a Breakout Year

As 2025 unfolds, industry insiders and LPs alike are calling Beyond Alpha Ventures one of the most promising hybrid investment vehicles on the market. With a robust pipeline, a world-class portfolio, and a CEO whose clarity and courage continue to define the firm’s trajectory, BAV is not just a hedge fund to watch—it’s a blueprint for the next era of capital innovation.

Contact: Abigail Lincoln, +44 7856 126 983

SOURCE Beyond Alpha Ventures

Founded by ex-Optiver and IMC quants, the platform is backed by angels from Citadel, Jane Street, and JPMorgan

NEW YORK, April 24, 2025 — Theo, a novel network connecting onchain capital to global markets via institutional-grade trading infrastructure, today announced it has raised $20 million in funding. The round was jointly led by Hack VC and Anthos Capital, with participation from numerous other venture capital firms, including Manifold Trading, Mirana Ventures, Metalayer Ventures, Flowdesk, SCB, MEXC, Amber Group, and Selini Capital, as well as angels from a range of leading TradFi trading firms including Citadel, Jane Street, HRT, Optiver, IMC, 5 Rings, and JPMorgan. 

Founded by former quant traders; Abhi Pingle, Arijit Pingle, and TK Kwon who honed their expertise at elite trading firms Optiver and IMC Trading, Theo was born from a recognition: while onchain capital is growing exponentially, access to traditional and institutional-grade strategies remain out of reach for everyday users. Theo aims to bridge this gap – delivering the sophistication of Wall Street to the retail investor.

Theo’s platform provides access to institutional-grade trading infrastructure that supports a wide range of strategies traditionally reserved for hedge funds and proprietary trading firms. At its core, Theo operates a custom low-latency validator set that ensures custodial guarantees for users, while enforcing rule-based access for institutional counterparties like market makers and trading firms.

These validators facilitate real-time execution across centralized exchanges (CEXes) and decentralized protocols (DeFi), while enforcing margin requirements and maintaining system-wide overcollateralization. Retail users can access these strategies via a simple deposit into strategy-specific vaults—without the complexity of multiple exchange accounts or algorithmic trading knowledge.

“Today’s crypto markets are fragmented and inefficient, preventing institutions and everyday users alike from accessing the full promise of global, permissionless finance,” says Abhi Pingle, co-founder of Theo. “Theo solves this by delivering robust, scalable infrastructure that seamlessly connects large traditional players and retail participants on-chain—unlocking new levels of capital efficiency.”

Theo strategies allow anyone to passively access professional trading strategies by simply depositing assets, with the platform handling execution, risk, and dynamic capital allocation across approaches like high-frequency arbitrage, cross-chain funding rate optimization, and advanced hedging.

As market conditions shift, Theo’s infrastructure dynamically reallocates capital to maintain performance, where single-strategy platforms often see returns diminish. This flexibility ensures greater stability and performance for retail participants.

For trading firms, Theo enables superior capital efficiency. By leveraging user capital through vault participation, firms can cross-margin strategy positions against their proprietary trades—unlocking alpha while users share in the upside. This creates a mutually beneficial ecosystem: institutional-grade strategies, retail accessibility, and shared value creation.

Theo’s architecture is uniquely positioned to connect traditional and crypto-native financial venues. As the industry evolves, Theo’s role as an infrastructure layer will be instrumental in bridging legacy markets and the onchain economy—democratizing access to advanced financial tools worldwide.

About Theo

Theo is an institutional-grade trading infrastructure platform founded by former quant traders from IMC Trading and Optiver. The platform enables retail users to access sophisticated high-frequency trading and market-making strategies previously available only to Wall Street firms, while providing trading firms with new opportunities to capture alpha through their market expertise with superior capital efficiency. Learn more at theo.xyz

SOURCE Theo Network

HACKENSACK, N.J., April 24, 2025 — MAX Surgical Specialty Management (“MAX” or the “Company”), the premier surgeon-led provider of oral and maxillofacial surgery (OMS), announced today that it has closed on a $77 million senior credit facility provided by Freeport Financial Partners, LLC (“Freeport“). The financing will support the next phase of the company’s strategic growth, with a focus on forming new partnerships with leading OMS practices across the Northeast.

“Staying close to the communities we serve is at the heart of our partnership strategy,” said Mark Censoprano, Co-CEO of MAX. “This capital allows us to expand strategically throughout the region, building relationships where they matter most. Each new partnership reinforces our position as the premier OMS support platform in the Northeast.”

In conjunction with the financing, MAX has partnered with Rothman and Kim Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery (“RKOMS”), a leading provider in the Philadelphia market with a second location in Cinnaminson, New Jersey. For over 25 years, Marc Rothman, DMD, M. David Kim, DMD, and their team have delivered exceptional patient care throughout the region. RKOMS marks MAX’s second partnership in Pennsylvania.

The RKOMS partnership follows the recent addition of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery of Westfield to MAX’s network. Under the leadership of Ronen Gold, DDS, the practice has established a strong reputation in Westfield, New Jersey, for clinical excellence and a patient-first approach. This collaboration further strengthens MAX’s growing network and solidifies its leadership position throughout New Jersey.

“MAX is assembling a network of elite oral and maxillofacial surgeons who share a vision of advancing excellence in patient care,” said Dr. Jason M. Auerbach, Founder and Co-CEO of MAX. “Drs. Rothman, Kim and Gold have spent decades building outstanding reputations in their markets. With MAX’s operational support and access to capital, they are now positioned to grow even further and continue leading innovation in the specialty.”

Since January 2024, MAX has added 14 practice locations and 17 surgeons to its network across New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Connecticut. The company’s total headcount has nearly doubled to over 300 in the last 15 months, driven by rapid expansion into new markets and investments in clinical and operational talent.

“This investment in MAX reflects deep confidence in the platform’s outstanding performance, disciplined execution and leadership team,” said Matt Gerdes, Managing Director of Freeport Financial Partners. “MAX’s strong fundamentals and long-term value creation potential presented a compelling opportunity.”

MAX’s concentrated network of OMS practices in the Northeast offers strategic advantages in regional insights, established relationships and contracting leverage.

About MAX Surgical Specialty Management
Established in September 2022 as the Northeast region’s premier oral and maxillofacial surgery platform, MAX Surgical Specialty Management is a surgeon-led management services organization developed with clinical and surgeon autonomy at its core. Today, MAX supports surgeons across New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont and Connecticut, enabling practices to channel resources, skills and knowledge within the oral surgery specialty, leading industry advancements and delivering the highest standard of patient care. Surgeons have access to a curated network that allows them to collaborate with and work alongside a diverse pool of highly skilled peers who are leaders in their specialty. MAX safeguards surgeons’ independence while offering robust support systems, access to advanced technology and opportunities for financial growth.

MAX is backed by MedEquity Capital, RF Investment Partners and Kian Capital. Visit max-ssm.com for more information.

About MedEquity Capital
Headquartered in Wellesley, Massachusetts, MedEquity Capital is a health care private equity firm that focuses on investing in profitable health care services businesses, most often in the lower-middle market. Since its founding over 20 years ago, MedEquity has invested over $400 million of equity capital, with top decile returns for its investors. Further information is available at www.medequity.com

About RF Investment Partners
RF Investment Partners (“RF”), a relationship-first, lower-middle-market private capital firm, provides innovative and flexible capital primarily for family- and founder-owned businesses. We structure each investment to align our shared goals and interests with each company’s management team, while providing less dilutive capital. RF brings operational and deep sector-based expertise to support our portfolio companies across the healthcare services, software, and business services sectors. RF manages approximately $700 million and has the capabilities to provide equity and debt capital to support strategic initiatives such as acquisition financing, growth capital investments, recapitalizations, refinancings, and management buyouts. To learn more, please visit www.rf-partners.com

About Kian Capital Partners
At Kian, we forge partnerships to ignite growth and build enduring value. Our goal is to provide flexible financial resources and additional operational horsepower to scale lower-middle-market businesses, realize aspirations and deliver long-term investment returns through genuine partnership. Proud to be recognized on Inc.’s Founder-Friendly Investors list for five consecutive years, Kian is a private investment firm with over $1 billion of capital under management and a focus on four core industry sectors: services, value-added distribution, consumer and specialty manufacturing. Our team of seasoned investors has over 100 years of collective experience providing transformational capital solutions and board-level strategic and operational guidance to founder/owner-operated businesses. To learn more, visit www.kiancapital.com

About Freeport Financial
Freeport has the industry expertise, product knowledge and flexibility to serve the financing needs of private equity investors and the management teams with whom they invest. Freeport’s principals have invested together since 2005 and have provided $10 billion in loan commitments to more than 600 companies. Freeport became part of Moelis Asset Management LP in 2012 and is committed to providing highly competitive financing solutions to lower-middle-market companies. To learn more, visit www.freeportfinancialpartners.com

SOURCE MAX Surgical Specialty Management

Sevii Unveils Revolutionary Autonomous AI Agents that Empower CISOs and Security Teams to Stay Ahead of Modern Cyber Threats.

CHARLOTTE, N.C., April 24, 2025 — Sevii, a cybersecurity innovator building a next-generation autonomous agentic AI defense platform, today announced the successful closure of its pre-seed funding round. The round was led by Overline, with participation from 10VC and SaaS Ventures.

Sevii is pioneering an Autonomous Defense and Remediation (ADR) platform that deploys an agentic ‘army’ of AI cyber warriors to actively manage detections at the edge while triaging and remediating cyber threats at machine speed. By seamlessly integrating with a customer’s existing security tools, Sevii dramatically reduces mean time to triage and remediate (MTTR) and significantly lessens the operational burden on security teams across all layers of a customer’s cyber defense controls.

“Our mission at Sevii is simple: outpace adversaries by empowering defenders with autonomous cyber agents that act, adapt, and remediate in real time,” said Curt Aubley, CEO and Co-founder of Sevii. “Today’s security teams face significant challenges from the rapid evolution of AI-enhanced adversaries that are faster and more aggressive than ever. Sevii offers intelligent agentic AI technology that goes beyond traditional SOC co-pilot productivity tools. Our platform is always active and continuously evolving, with built-in AI guardrails that ensure all remediation actions occur as close to the edge as possible while remaining under the customer’s control.”

Sevii’s ADR platform is designed to enable customers to swiftly counter adversarial threats, significantly reducing the time to achieve their objectives. By rapidly triaging and remediating threats at the edge, Sevii minimizes potential damage from intrusions and lowers risk for customers, while alleviating the workload of already strained security teams. As attack volume rises, Sevii scales its agentic ‘army’ to match increased threats, eliminating the need for customers to expand headcount or rely on outsourcing. The Sevii platform seamlessly integrates with existing security tools and AI co-pilots, maximizing a customer’s current investments while delivering enhanced protection at a fraction of the cost of additional staffing or outsourcing contracts.

“This isn’t just automation or an AI SOC productivity tool—it’s a reimagining of the entire security operations model,” said Michael Cohn, Managing Partner at Overline. “Sevii’s platform provides security teams with a force multiplier that can proactively defend and autonomously remediate, unlocking a new era of cost-effective, agentic AI-powered defense.”

The funding will accelerate platform development, go-to-market execution, and expansion of Sevii’s growing team of AI engineers and cybersecurity veterans.

To learn more or request early access, visit https://sevii.ai.

About Sevii

Sevii is a pioneering cybersecurity company focused on delivering next-generation Autonomous Defense and Remediation (ADR) solutions powered by agentic AI. The company’s innovative ADR platform utilizes a ‘cyber army’ of autonomous AI agents that operate at machine speeds to proactively detect, triage, and remediate threats in real-time. Sevii’s platform seamlessly integrates with customers’ existing security tools, platforms, and AI Co-Pilots, dramatically reducing the time to respond to cyber threats while lowering costs and operational burdens. Designed for scale, Sevii empowers security teams to meet the evolving challenges of modern cybersecurity without the need for additional headcount or reliance on outsourcing. For more information, contact: [email protected]

SOURCE Sevii

Backed by MissionOG and Third Prime, funding will accelerate automation and global expansion in overlooked B2B sectors

NEW YORK, April 24, 2025 — Alternative Payments, a leading fully-integrated B2B payments and checkout infrastructure provider, today announced that they have closed on $22 million in total funding, with rounds led by MissionOG and Third Prime, respectively. The investments will advance the company’s mission to digitize and automate B2B payment workflows for industries historically overlooked by fintech innovation.

The capital will accelerate the development of mission-critical, autonomous payment solutions and scale the company’s go-to-market team. Alternative Payments is focused on digitally transforming underserved industries, such as IT service providers, managed services providers, and blue-collar industries — sectors that have long relied on outdated systems to manage accounts receivable and payable, to access merchant services, and to offer client-facing financing. Its turnkey, automated platform delivers a modern, streamlined alternative to legacy payments and financing providers.

With deep expertise in system integrations, Alternative Payments is addressing longstanding B2B payment challenges, such as delayed invoice processing, poor invoice deliverability, reliance on paper-based systems, and cross-border friction. The company has been able to reduce days sales outstanding by 40-50% for its customer base, by empowering businesses to confidently automate historically manual workstreams and prioritize faster settlement and global accessibility. Since 2024, Alternative Payments has grown its total processing volume by nearly 5.0x.

“Innovation in payments is a powerful catalyst for growth, especially in these uncertain times,” said Baxter Lanius, CEO of Alternative Payments. “By accelerating how and when businesses get paid, we’re not just improving cash flow—we’re unlocking greater efficiency, stability, and confidence for companies around the world. This raise marks an exciting new chapter for Alternative Payments, allowing us to scale our impact, expand globally, and continue building the infrastructure that will define the future of seamless, secure payments for underserved industries.”  

“We’re excited to partner with the Alternative Payments team as they bring modern, autonomous payment solutions to B2B sectors often ignored by legacy providers. Their focus on automation, ease of use, and advanced analytics positions them to lead the transformation in how businesses manage payments and cash flow,” said Rob Metzger, MissionOG General Partner.

To learn more about Alternative Payments, visit the website.

About Alternative Payments

Alternative Payments is a B2B payments and checkout infrastructure company. Alternative Payments’ end-to-end payment platform provides immediate access to merchant services, including credit card, ACH bank transfer, and client-facing financing (B2B buy now pay later). Its software fully integrates with a company’s ERP and/or accounting software, tracking all accounts receivable, reconciling all payments, and accelerating a client’s time-to-pay. On average, Alternative Payments customers are paid 40-50% faster driven by automated workflows.

Media Contact:

[email protected]

SOURCE Alternative Payments

HOUSTON, April 24, 2025 — X2 Resources, LLC (“X2”) today announced it has secured an equity capital commitment from EnCap Investments L.P. (“EnCap”), Westlawn Group LLC (“Westlawn”), Rice Investment Group (“RIG”), and its management team.

With its robust sponsor support, X2 is targeting $500 million to multibillion-dollar acquisition opportunities across premier oil and gas basins. X2’s deep bench of talented team members and unique culture are its foundations for building and executing large-scale oil and gas developments.

Gray Lisenby, CEO of X2, commented “We are thrilled to be in partnership with EnCap, Westlawn, and RIG, and deeply appreciate their support and trust. Our equity partners and operating team are aligned and confident in our ability to develop large-scale assets and generate attractive risk-adjusted returns.”

“We are excited to partner with X2 in its next venture. X2 has a proven track record of excellence, and we believe the team is well positioned to capture a significant asset base and execute on a large-scale development program in an efficient and responsible manner to create value for its shareholders. We greatly appreciate our long-standing partnership with Gray and the X2 team and look forward to building another successful enterprise together,” said Jason DeLorenzo, Managing Partner of EnCap.

Previously, the team led the successful growth and sale of XCL Resources, LLC (“XCL”) to SM Energy Company and Northern Oil and Gas, Inc. for $2.64 billion in October 2024. XCL drilled 250 wells across 12 formations in Utah’s Uinta Basin, growing oil production from 10,000 to 60,000 barrels per day.

Vinson & Elkins LLP served as legal counsel to EnCap, Winston & Strawn LLP served as legal counsel to Westlawn, and Latham & Watkins LLP served as legal counsel to X2 on the formation of the new company.

About EnCap Investments L.P.

Since 1988, EnCap Investments L.P. has been a leading provider of venture capital to the independent sector of the U.S. energy industry. The firm has raised 25 institutional funds totaling more than $47 billion and currently manages capital on behalf of more than 350 U.S. and international investors. For more information, please visit www.encapinvestments.com.

About Westlawn Group

Founded in 2021, Westlawn is a Houston-based private investment firm focused on long-term investment in the global oil and gas industry. Westlawn acquires operated and non-operated interests in producing, development and exploration assets, as well as technologies that improve production. For more information, please visit www.westlawn.com.

About Rice Investment Group

Rice Investment Group (RIG) is a multi-strategy investment fund backed by the Rice family. The Rice brothers founded Rice Energy that later merged with EQT to form the largest natural gas producer in North America. RIG focuses on situations where its technical and strategic expertise can add shareholder value. For more information, please visit www.riceinvestmentgroup.com.

Media Contact
Lauren Brown
[email protected]
www.x2r.com

SOURCE X2 Resources

Series A Investment Led by SYN Ventures with Participation from Existing Investor Peak XV Partners (Formerly Sequoia Capital SEA)

PALO ALTO, Calif., April 24, 2025 — SquareX, the pioneer in Browser Detection and Response (BDR), announced it is closing a $20 million in Series A funding led by SYN Ventures, a leading venture capital firm focused on cybersecurity investments, with participation from existing investor Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia Capital SEA).

The browser has become a primary target for cyberattacks, creating a significant gap in enterprise security. Traditional security tools lack visibility into browser threats, while proprietary enterprise browsers can introduce friction, hindering user productivity and adoption. As the industry’s first Browser Detection and Response (BDR) solution, SquareX’s browser extension converts any browser into an enterprise-grade secure browser, providing the same functionality as dedicated enterprise browsers and more without the cumbersome change management. This unique approach revolutionizes browser security empowering enterprises to effectively manage threats like malicious extensions, phishing, genAI data leakage, insider threats, and more, directly within the browser environment, significantly reducing the enterprise attack surface without compromising user experience.

“The browser is the new endpoint, yet it remains a major blind spot for most organizations. Existing solutions often force a trade-off between security and usability,” said Vivek Ramachandran, CEO of SquareX. “We built SquareX to eliminate this compromise in browser security, offering robust protection that works with the browsers users are already familiar with. This Series A funding, led by the team at SYN Ventures, validates our vision of everyone being able to be online without fear.”

Jay Leek, Managing Partner & Founder of SYN Ventures, commented, “SquareX is tackling one of the most significant and underserved areas in cybersecurity today. The browser is ground zero for countless attacks, and the team at SquareX has developed an elegant and powerful solution that provides critical visibility and control where it’s needed most – directly within the native browser experience.”

“Having partnered with SquareX since their seed stage, we’ve been impressed by their vision and execution in tackling browser security challenges,” said Shailendra Singh, Managing Director, Peak XV. “We are excited to partner with them again as they demonstrate strong results in delivering much-needed cybersecurity capabilities to enterprise customers.”

About SquareX

SquareX is the pioneer of Browser Detection and Response (BDR), empowering organizations to proactively detect, mitigate, and effectively threat-hunt client-side web attacks. Through a simple browser extension, SquareX provides critical protection against a wide range of browser security threats, including malicious browser extensions, advanced spearphishing, browser-native ransomware, genAI DLP, and more. Find out more on www.sqrx.com.

About SYN Ventures 

SYN Ventures is a venture capital firm focused on investing in disruptive and innovative security companies in the cybersecurity, industrial security, national defense, privacy, regulatory compliance, and data governance industries. The firm’s dedicated security team of former CISOs, CEOs, CTOs and Founders has a proven track record with over 400 years of combined security investing and operational experience. SYN also has a highly distinguished network of seasoned security advisors and CISOs.

SOURCE SquareX

PORTLAND, Ore., April 24, 2025 — Araceli Biosciences, a pioneering biotechnology company revolutionizing high-content imaging and AI-powered analysis, today announced the successful completion of its Seed funding round, raising $7.2 million in new equity investment and converting $4.0 million in SAFEs, bringing total financing since Araceli’s spinout from Phoseon Technology to $11.2M. This funding will accelerate Araceli’s commercial expansion, scale manufacturing, and advance its next-generation AI-driven product offerings in high-content imaging.

Disrupting the Imaging Bottleneck in Drug Discovery
The Endeavor® High Content Imaging System is Araceli’s flagship platform, designed for ultra high-throughput imaging with exceptional data—delivering results up to 40x faster than traditional systems across a broad range of cellular assays. Paired with Clairvoyance, Araceli’s AI-driven analysis software, the platform delivers rapid, actionable insights that streamline workflows, reduce experimental errors, and dramatically speed up drug discovery timelines.

While advances in automation, genomics, and machine learning have transformed drug discovery, high-content imaging remains one of the slowest steps and a major bottleneck. Traditional imaging systems lack the speed and scalability required for modern AI-driven pipelines and multiplexed assays. Araceli addresses this critical gap with a platform purpose-built for speed, scale, and seamless AI integration—enabling researchers to generate more data, faster, with greater precision.

Strategic Use of Funds
Proceeds from the Seed round will support:

• Scaling operational infrastructure to meet growing demand
• Advancing market applications, including personalized medicine
• Advancing the platform’s hardware and software for real-time analysis capabilities
• Expanding marketing and business development efforts

“The future of AI-driven drug discovery and personalized medicine depends on imaging and analysis that happens in real time,” said Matt Beaudet, CEO of Araceli Biosciences. “Minutes and seconds matter. The old model of waiting hours—or even days—for data is over. At Araceli, we’re building a platform that moves at the speed of science.”

Bill Cortelyou, Board Chairman and lead investor, added, “Araceli’s breakthrough technology, experienced leadership, and clear market demand position the company well for significant growth potential.”

About Araceli Biosciences
Araceli Biosciences is a biotechnology company focused on accelerating drug discovery through innovations in high-content imaging and AI-driven analysis. With its flagship Endeavor® system and Clairvoyance software, Araceli empowers scientists to generate actionable insights faster and more efficiently across a wide range of biological applications.

Corporate Contact: Shawn MacDonald CFO, Araceli Biosciences
[email protected]
https://www.aracelibio.com/Corporate-Relations

SOURCE Araceli Biosciences

Firm’s geographic alpha strategy focuses on backing founders who localize proven, successful business models in high-potential regions, in fintech, commerce and health.

SAN FRANCISCO, April 24, 2025 — Fluent Ventures, a new global early-stage venture capital firm founded by investor and author Alex Lazarow, today announced its debut program. Fluent’s approach—what it calls geographic alpha—focuses on backing founders who localize successful business models in high-potential regions, across fintech, health and commerce. The firm plans to invest $40m through its hybrid platform, including a fund and a co-investment strategy.

“Fluent was born from a simple belief: the best ideas can come from anywhere—and scale everywhere,” said Alex Lazarow, General Partner at Fluent Ventures.

The firm’s current portfolio spans North America, Latin America, the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and Asia—representing a new, globally distributed venture playbook. Early investments include:

• Sabi – a B2B marketplace transforming agricultural and industrial supply chains in Nigeria
• BRKZ – a Saudi construction tech platform led by Careem’s former COO
• Prima – a B2B manufacturing platform based in Mexico
• Baton and Iconic – U.S.-based startups innovating in small business M&A and AI-driven brokerage

Fluent is backed by more than 75 value-added LPs including unicorn founders, operators, and global investors, including David Vélez (Nubank), Adal Flores (Kueski), Sean Harper (Kin), Nick Nash (SEA Group), Akshay Garg (Kredivo), JC Glancy (ZenBusiness), and Lucas Ward (Kin).

“Business models don’t copy-paste. Context matters,” said David Vélez, cofounder and CEO of Nubank. “Fluent understands that while global problems may be universal, their solutions need to be adapted—and that’s where the opportunity lies.”

The firm’s strategy draws from Lazarow’s decade of experience at global funds including Omidyar Network and Cathay Innovation, where he invested in companies like Chime, Neon, Kin, Sidecar Health and others. It also builds on the thesis of his book Out-Innovate (Harvard Business Press), which explores how global entrepreneurs are rewriting the rules of Silicon Valley. The book has been translated into four languages and serves as the intellectual foundation for Fluent’s work.

“In 2013, just four cities had produced a unicorn. Today, it’s more than 150,” said Lazarow. “Entrepreneurship has gone global—and Fluent was built for exactly this shift.”

SOURCE Fluent Ventures