Series A Round Led by Fin Capital Will Be Used to Onboard and Support New Enterprise Partnerships and Further Advance the Company’s Unique Behavioral Engine

NEW YORK, Oct. 11, 2023 — Carefull, an AI-powered financial safety platform that helps banks and wealth advisors protect aging customers from scams and money mistakes, today announced that it has closed its Series A round with $16.5 million in funding. The round was led by Fin Capital and joined by Bessemer Venture Partners, TTV Capital, Commerce Ventures, Montage Ventures, and Alloy Labs, bringing the company’s total funding to $19.7 million.

Carefull is the financial ecosystem’s first Protect-Retain-Transfer (PRT) provider: a tech solution that enables banks, financial advisors, and insurers to protect older adults – their most valuable and vulnerable customers – from outside threats and even their own money mistakes, while the institution retains their assets and deposits for longer and builds relationships with next-generation family members ahead of wealth transfer. Carefull actively scans all customer account types for over 50 financial and behavioral issues unique to aging, catching unusual activity, suspicious patterns, and even bigger problems like financial exploitation by a loved one or signs of cognitive decline. The platform also integrates identity, credit and home title monitoring; $1M in identity theft insurance; a password and document vault; and a smarter Trusted Contacts system for banks to gain “share of family” in addition to share of wallet.

“There are now 45 million people across the country who are tasked with managing an aging loved one’s money, and older Americans lose $37 billion annually to fraud and money mistakes. The growing role of the financial institution to help families here cannot be understated,” said Todd Rovak, Co-founder and Co-CEO of Carefull.

“Banks, wealth advisors, and financial caregivers need a solution that customers actually want to use,” added Carefull Co-founder and Co-CEO Max Goldman. “Our approach of empowering and including the financial institution has led to tremendous growth over the past four years, so this new infusion of capital will help us reach even more aging Americans and their families.”

Over the past year, Carefull has rapidly expanded its footprint to include more than 35 financial institutions and advisor groups. The Cooperative Bank in Roslindale, Massachusetts recently won a 2023 Community Commitment Award from the American Bankers Association for its use of Carefull to protect older Americans from fraud and unusual account activity. As of Q3 2023, Carefull has been shown to reduce customer account churn and attrition by as much as 10x in partner banks, and has generated as many as 60 new leads per wealth advisor.

“Carefull has emerged as an instrumental solution for financial caregivers and banks alike, and we’re proud to support the company through the next phase of their growth,” said Christian Ostberg, General Partner at Fin Capital. “As younger family members step in to manage their loved ones’ finances, there is an estimated $84 trillion in wealth transfer underway. Financial institutions and advisors are actively seeking out ways to help families through this time of transition while building relationships with their next generation of customers. Carefull’s full-stack financial safety suite is a critical step in solving many of the acute issues in the category, and we’re excited about where the team is headed.”

Carefull’s new capital will be used to scale onboarding and support for new partners, enhance R&D efforts aimed at protecting older adults, and build capacity to meet new state regulations that require more protections for aging Americans. To learn more about partnering with Carefull, contact [email protected].

About Carefull 
Carefull is the financial ecosystem’s first Protect-Retain-Transfer (PRT) provider: a tech solution for financial institutions and wealth advisors to protect customers aged 55+ from financial threats, retain assets and deposits for longer, and bridge to the next generation ahead of wealth transfer. Founded in 2019, Carefull’s AI-powered platform actively scans all customer account types for over 50 financial and behavioral issues unique to aging by detecting unusual activity, suspicious patterns, and even bigger problems like financial exploitation by a loved one or signs of cognitive decline. Carefull was built from the ground up to serve both aging adults and financial caregivers, and is currently being used across banks, credit unions, wealth advisors and insurers. For more information, please visit https://getcarefull.com/.

SOURCE Carefull

Funding Accelerates Deployment of Novel Drilling and Subsurface Technologies
That Increase Speed and Lower Cost of Constructing Geothermal HVAC Systems To Decarbonize Urban Buildings

LOS ANGELES and AUSTIN, Texas, Oct. 11, 2023 — Bedrock Energy, a technology startup that designs, constructs, and delivers geothermal heating and cooling systems, today announced $8.5M in seed capital. The financing round is led by Wireframe Ventures, with participation from Overture Climate VC, Long Journey Ventures, Cantos, Toba Capital, First Star Ventures, Divergent Capital, and Climate Capital. The funding will accelerate manufacturing and deployment of technologies that improve the economics of all-electric geothermal HVAC systems, thus helping real estate properties achieve Net Zero operations.

Bedrock is developing a novel technology stack that combines autonomous drilling and advanced subsurface modeling to triple the speed and space-efficiency of geothermal projects. These advantages enable geothermal HVAC to fit onto dense, urban locations, with sensors that uniquely validate real-time construction accuracy. Payback periods under five years enable real estate owners and investors to decarbonize large properties with double-digit internal rates of return.

“For decades, geothermal heat pumps have been the most energy-efficient form of HVAC, but adoption has historically been slow due to the upfront cost, time, and space required to construct the borefields that provide such stellar thermal efficiency,” said Joselyn Lai, co-founder and CEO of Bedrock Energy. “We believe our technologies fundamentally change the equation. A huge swath of commercial and industrial real estate can now benefit economically from carbon-free geothermal HVAC due to Bedrock’s unparalleled speed, cost, compactness, and reliability—making adoption a logical business and sustainability decision.” 

Federal incentives can offset the upfront cost of geothermal systems by 30%-60%, while local and state climate policies are increasingly pressuring large real estate owners to look for ways to decarbonize their assets. These factors, combined with Bedrock’s technology innovations, position geothermal heating and cooling as a leading path to reduce emissions and energy costs for urban buildings across the U.S.

“We believe Bedrock Energy will significantly lower the carbon intensity and cost to heat and cool commercial buildings,” said Paul Straub, managing partner at Wireframe Ventures. “We are so impressed by this team’s approach to product. They have built a solution that can scale in a market where federal incentives, decarbonization mandates and rising energy prices are all conspiring to form a perfect moment for Bedrock’s mission.”

Bedrock’s team combines decades of experience in oil and gas technology, oilfield operations, software, and startup operations. Since its inception in 2022, the company has focused its efforts on designing and manufacturing its drilling assets, developing subsurface physics modeling software, and building out its multi-disciplinary team.

“Our team’s ability to develop, test, and deploy technology at a rapid pace will greatly contribute to decarbonization of the built environment,” said Silviu Livescu, co-founder and CTO, who has held roles as Chief Scientist at Baker Hughes and professor at UT Austin. “We are eager to show how Bedrock’s technology can unlock the potential of this limitless, carbon-free asset to decarbonize buildings everywhere.”

Bedrock’s approach is versatile, with applications across a wide range of retrofits and new construction. With initial applications across retail, light industrial, office, education, or commercial, the company is open to projects across the continental U.S. in 2024 including academic, non-commercial, or other strategic partnership opportunities.

About Bedrock Energy
Bedrock Energy is a startup transforming the heating and cooling of buildings, using geothermal energy to radically reduce costs for people and the environment. Bedrock designs, constructs, and delivers geothermal using novel drilling technologies that enable widespread, affordable, and accessible installations of carbon-free geothermal HVAC for urban real estate properties. This allows properties to reduce heating and cooling costs up to 50% and cut direct emissions to zero. To learn more, visit bedrockenergy.com. 

Business Contact:
[email protected]

Media Contact:
Chris Allieri
[email protected] 

SOURCE Bedrock Energy

Financing will support SHINE’s four-phased approach to fusion, and accelerate the domestic production of medical isotopes

JANESVILLE, Wis., Oct. 11, 2023 — SHINE Technologies, LLC, a next-generation fusion technology company, today announced it has raised $70 million in additional funding. The round was led by existing investors including Baillie Gifford and Fidelity Management & Research Company, and also includes participation from new institutional investors. This round will complete the commercialization and scale-up of the company’s near-term applications of fusion technology, which are used in the industrial, defense, and healthcare markets.

SHINE is deploying a four-phased approach that commercializes fusion today while scaling its technology into the future. This approach provides important near-term economic and social benefits, while building a profitable foundation for the company to sustainably grow toward its longer term objectives in energy.

“From the beginning, our purpose has been to deliver cost-effective fusion technologies to help the world, with a long term goal of providing cost-effective fusion energy. Our approach is differentiated in that it’s grounded in a pragmatic, market-driven path. This financing is expected to carry us through several major inflection points, including profitability as we continue to refine fusion technology to solve today’s problems in medicine, manufacturing, energy and beyond,” said Greg Piefer, founder and CEO of SHINE. “We’re now ramping our production of Lu-177 to get life-saving medicine to  cancer patients more quickly. It’s the latest use of our technology to improve the world, and adds to our neutron inspection and radiation effects testing businesses, which are helping ensure people are safe through applications in aerospace, space and defense. Ultimately, these success stories will build value, as well as the skills and credibility needed to achieve our ultimate goal of achieving affordable fusion energy.”

This summer, SHINE announced the opening of Cassiopeia, the largest lutetium-177 production facility in North America. The company is now finalizing the commissioning of the facility, which is expected to become operational at the end of this year. SHINE made its first commercial sales of Lu-177 in 2020.

Lu-177 is a radioactive agent that, when paired with a cancer-seeking molecule, delivers highly targeted radiation to cancer metastases, killing cancer cells while minimizing damage to surrounding healthy cells. At full capacity, the facility is expected to be capable of producing up to 200,000 doses of life-saving treatment per year. At a time when vital pharmaceuticals and therapy treatments are in limited supply, this financing will accelerate U.S.-based production and commercialization of critical medical isotopes used in millions of procedures annually.  

“The success of Lu-177-based cancer treatments in extending patients’ lives around the world is exciting. SHINE’s unique approach is solving critical problems in the radioisotope supply chain and helping get these medicines to the people who need them,” said Luke Ward, Investment Manager at Baillie Gifford. “We look forward to continuing our partnership as SHINE scales its fusion technology to tackle even bigger challenges and create a safer, healthier and cleaner world.” 

To learn more about SHINE and its four phased approach to fusion please visit https://www.shinefusion.com

About SHINE Technologies

SHINE deploys its safe, cost-effective and environmentally friendly fusion technology in a stepwise approach. Its systems are used to inspect industrial components in aerospace, defense, energy and other sectors. SHINE’s proprietary medical isotope production processes currently create non-carrier-added lutetium-177 and are expected to create molybdenum-99 once its medical isotope production facility, The Chrysalis, is operational. These important medicines are used in tens of thousands of daily procedures to diagnose and treat heart disease, late-stage cancer, and other serious illnesses. In the future, SHINE plans to scale its fusion technology to help solve one of energy’s toughest hurdles by recycling nuclear waste. Through a purpose-driven and phased approach, SHINE aims to generate fusion power to deliver clean, abundant energy that could transform life on Earth. Learn more at shinefusion.com and follow us @shinefusion.

SOURCE SHINE Technologies, LLC

Innovative LA-based Film Tech Start-up Draws Investment from Top Industry Players.

LOS ANGELES, Oct. 11, 2023 — KINO, the pioneer reshaping entertainment economics through tech, proudly announced an oversubscribed pre-seed funding round, raising a staggering $2M.

High-profile contributors to the round included Sequoia Capital’s Scout program, Blockchain Founders Fund, Slow Ventures, Metaweb Ventures, Genius Ventures, The Near Protocol, and an assortment of industry experts and angel investors. KINO’s mission is to equip filmmakers with state-of-the-art tools to engage, create, and monetize their content even before it hits the screens, addressing a massive gap in the market.

“During the production cycle, film and TV shows currently do zero marketing or product market fit,” states co-founder Daril Fannin, “This means that the industry is wasting billions of dollars annually, and our technology solves that inefficiency.”

With credits to his name like projects with Matt Damon and Jimmy Kimmel for giants such as Netflix and Disney, CEO Daril Fannin spearheaded KINO alongside Austin Worrell. Austin, COO, is a seasoned tech entrepreneur with impressive credentials from USC Law and the London School of Economics.

“The film and television creator economy is drastically changing— has drastically changed with the rise of the internet, and crucially social media apps like Instagram and Tik Tok,” emphasizes co-founder Austin Worrell. “KINO empowers artists to harness these changes, unlocking new revenue streams and pushing for fairer industry standards.”

Already, KINO captivates over a million film aficionados monthly. Its avant-garde app, available for early access on the App Store, offers a plethora of features from celebrity live-streams and exclusive behind-the-scenes content to authentic movie merchandise and exclusive red-carpet event tickets.

With a powerful lineup of advisors and partners from industry giants like Netflix, Disney, HBO, and more, KINO is poised to make waves.

“The film and TV industry has often lagged in tech adoption. KINO’s groundbreaking approach bridges this gap, tapping into the creator economy and redefining audience engagement. We’re thrilled to back their vision.” – Tobias Bauer, Partner at Blockchain Founders Fund.

ABOUT KINO STUDIO
KINO Studio brings the power of technology to film through community building, royalties processing, and IP discovery. KINO’s technology makes the entertainment industry faster, stronger, and more connected.

ABOUT KINO’S FOUNDERS
Daril Fannin (Co-Founder and CEO) is an executive producer, writer, and Army veteran who created, sold, and produced multiple multi-million dollar film and television projects with A-list talent such as Matt Damon, Peter Berg, and Jimmy Kimmel.

Austin Worrell (Co-Founder and COO) is a tech entrepreneur and graduate of the USC Gould School of Law, and the London School of Economics; his last Web3 startup reached over $10 million ARR in its first year with over 500k holders and a $500 million market cap.

SOURCE KINO

Generative AI-Powered Diligence Offering Accelerates Security Reviews from Four Weeks to a Few Hours

 SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 11, 2023 — Conveyor, the leading AI-powered platform that streamlines, automates, and scales customer security reviews, today announced a $12.5M Series A investment round led by Cervin Ventures. The funding will be used to support Conveyor’s growth, expand its team, and further advance the company’s generative AI solution to accurately convey a customer’s security posture in seconds instead of weeks. 

In today’s business world, an invisible but omnipresent thread weaves its way through every B2B sale: the security review, a thorough evaluation of a potential vendor partner’s security and compliance. This involves a detailed security questionnaire with hundreds of questions that vendors must complete, typically before negotiations can even occur. The manual nature of this process leads to weeks or even months of delay in the sales cycle, and completing these questionnaires is often cited as the “worst job in cybersecurity.“

Building trust with customers around data security has become a critical function in today’s digital economy. The practice of conducting security due diligence on third party vendors has grown over the last decade as cyber attacks now happen to at least 54% of companies annually. Enterprises are increasingly aware of their exposure to information security risks from many business partners, not just SaaS providers. Law firms, manufacturing companies, healthcare providers, and all kinds of other vendors are being vetted by their business partners for data security risks today.

Conveyor confronts this costly obstacle by streamlining this tedious, manual process with its comprehensive security review automation platform. Its trust portal simplifies the exchange of security information, allowing vendors to easily and securely share documents, FAQs, and showcase crucial security details. Conveyor’s questionnaire completion software automatically generates human-like responses to security questions in the original questionnaire format, achieving over 90% accuracy while identifying low-confidence responses for human review.

“Conveyor automates what has previously been a manual, arduous, ‘light-your-hair-on-fire’ process. Ask anyone who has touched a security questionnaire – they are a notoriously painful and redundant activity which requires valuable employees’ time and will delay sales,” said Chas Ballew, Conveyor Founder and CEO. “Trust is paramount so while security reviews and proper due diligence are incredibly important, answering the same question 100 different ways is not. That’s why we built a sophisticated AI engine trained in security and compliance that auto-generates precise answers to entire questionnaires in seconds. Most importantly, it allows vendors to accelerate their sales process and close deals faster.”

Conveyor’s platform allows any vendor to instantly and accurately convey their security and compliance posture to any customer. Its solution relies on generative AI with a security and compliance trained large language model (LLM) and has grown to support more than a hundred vendors who benefit from a 91% reduction in time spent on security questionnaires and a 75% faster turnaround time for security reviews. To date, Conveyor’s AI has helped teams answer more than 20,000 security questions and free up their full-time employees to take on more meaningful security activities. When the average security review can take up to four weeks to complete from end to end, Conveyor’s powerful AI automation software currently reduces that process to minutes.

“Conveyor embodies a perfect use-case for leveraging AI: a manual, text-based problem that requires too much human intervention. Conveyor’s pioneering use of LLMs will ultimately eliminate this problem for sales and compliance teams worldwide,” said Daniel Karp, Cervin Ventures Partner. “We are big believers in Conveyor as their team is uniquely positioned to eliminate the pain of security reviews. Conveyor’s team felt this exact pain in their past company’s SaaS sales processes. They understand the importance of the user experience and approach the problem through the lens of a cohesive platform centered around the vendor’s and buyer’s needs. In getting to know the culture of the team, their vision for the compliance space and their technology, it became quite clear why a roster of existing customers like Carta, Lucid Software, and Freshworks, leverage Conveyor’s platform to build trust with customers and expedite the sales process.”

Ballew continued, “completing security reviews was once just for a few of the largest cloud software providers. Now it has become a key sales capability across a multitude of sectors, including law firms, insurance companies, consulting firms, and more. Every kind of business that sells to large customers is having to formally explain how it protects customer data during the sales process. Our AI helps vendors convey how they protect customer data while freeing up critical employees to work on what matters. Further out, we see a future with instant cybersecurity risk assessments for both the vendor and the customer. A future where evaluating a vendor is as easy as it is today to tap your phone at checkout to pay for your groceries.”

ABOUT CONVEYOR
Conveyor is the leading generative AI-powered platform that automates and scales the most tedious part of the sales process: customer security reviews. Trusted by the world’s top SaaS companies, Conveyor helps vendors build trust with customers while reducing the time spent on the mind-numbing task of sharing security information and answering security questionnaires by over 90%. Through the combination of its automated security questionnaire completion software and its trust portal, which allows documents and security information to be shared easily and securely, Conveyor ultimately helps vendors close sales faster. Conveyor’s lean team has deep and extensive collective experience in security and compliance. For more information, visit https://www.conveyor.com and follow us on LinkedIn.

MEDIA CONTACT
Marissa Arnold
[email protected]

SOURCE CONVEYOR

As companies increasingly use physical automation to solve labor and margin challenges, Formant’s platform delivers the data backbone that powers large-scale robotic fleets

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 11, 2023 — Formant, the leading robotics data and operations platform, today announced the completion of a $21 million funding round. The investment was led by BMW i Ventures, with participation from new investors Intel Capital, GS Futures and previous investors including SignalFire, Hillsven, Pelion Ventures, Holman, Ericsson, Goodyear Ventures, PICUS Capital and Thursday Ventures.

This latest fundraising round comes after a year of record growth for Formant, during which the company increased revenue by more than 500% year-over-year. Much of this growth has come from blue – chip enterprises such as Blue River Technology (a subsidiary of John Deere) and BP, as well as industry leaders like Burro, Scythe, and Knightscope. The company will use the proceeds to expand its hiring across all departments, introduce new products and features, and accelerate growth in 2023 and beyond.

“Formant is uniquely positioned to meet the business objectives and technical requirements of large enterprise companies operating at global scale looking to expand their robotics footprint,” says Jeff Linnell, CEO and Founder of Formant. “Our platform now powers tens of thousands of production robots around the world across dozens of different industries.”

In 2023 Formant expanded its focus to the enterprise, taking advantage of the accelerating adoption of intelligent robots across large organizations. Formant delivers a secure data platform to operate fleets of robots at any scale through a single pane of glass.

“Autonomous robotic systems have broken free from R&D departments and are now being deployed at scale to drive business outcomes and resilient operations,” says Kasper Sage, Managing Partner at BMW i Ventures. “Their proliferation across mission-critical functions as well as support tasks for humans in various industries underscores the urgent need for seamless data management and orchestration across robotic endpoints. Formant is the operating system underpinning the future of the automated enterprise.”

Formant’s rapid growth has been supported by a flurry of new product introductions and integrations, including enterprise-grade tools and account management features to empower enterprise customers. Earlier this year, the company launched Theopolis, the AI language interface that enables non-technical users to interact directly with robot data and build visualizations inside Formant.

“In the ever-evolving landscape of robotics and AI integration, Formant stands ready to take center stage. As industries embrace large-scale automation, the role of data becomes paramount in fleet optimization and AI model training,” says Kate MeLynda, President of Formant. “Formant’s cutting-edge platform simplifies the collection and management of robot data on a grand scale, ushering in a new era where AI seamlessly enhances physical automation.”

Formant is on a mission to underpin the intersection of robotics and AI for enterprises and robotics companies. To help teams get the most out of every robot, Formant also supports easy integrations with many of the industry’s leading tools such as ROS2, NVIDIA’s Isaac simulator, and Clearpath’s Outdoor Navigation.

About Formant
Formant is a cloud platform that helps robotics companies easily deploy, scale, and manage their fleets. Founded in 2017 by former roboticists at Google and Savioke, Formant’s platform powers tens of thousands of field-deployed robots from leading companies such as Knightscope, Scythe, and Burro.

About BMW i Ventures
BMW i Ventures is the independent venture capital firm of BMW Group, investing in startups defining the future of mobility, supply chain, and sustainability. The firm has made many successful investments over the years in companies such as Blackmore, ChargePoint, CelLink, Fox Robotics, GaN Systems, Plus One Robotics, Our Next Energy, Tekion, Xometry, and many more. BMW i Ventures invests in all stages from seed to growth with a focus on Series A/B. More information can be found at: https://www.bmwiventures.com.

Media Contact:
Shaun Juncal
[email protected]
805-245-8528

SOURCE Formant

Partnership Will Enhance Growth Opportunities, Providing Greater Financial Resources to EirTrade to Increase Market Share and Broaden Capabilities Offered

OKLAHOMA CITY and DUBLIN, Oct. 11, 2023 — EirTrade Aviation Ireland Limited (“EirTrade” or the “Company”), a leading aviation asset management solutions company, today announced that it has entered into partnership with, and received an investment from, Acorn Growth Companies, LLC (“Acorn”) to enhance its financial capabilities and become an even stronger partner to its customers, suppliers, and consignors in the aviation market. 

EirTrade’s founder, Ken Fitzgibbon, will remain Chief Executive Officer and will retain significant equity ownership in the Company. Adam Nemenyi, group CEO of Sentry Aerospares and an Acorn senior advisor specializing in aviation aftermarket investments, will serve on the Company’s Board of Directors.  EirTrade will be a new platform company within Acorn’s portfolio focused on end-of-life solutions for aviation assets. Acorn plans to augment the Company’s strong organic growth with additional capital for large and strategic asset purchases, as well as potential add-on acquisitions.

“We are excited to partner with Ken and EirTrade’s management team. Having known EirTrade for years through the industry and its interactions with our other portfolio companies, we have seen firsthand how critical the Company is to its asset-owner partners and customers,” said Rick Nagel, Managing Partner of Acorn. “The technical expertise resident within the Company is second-to-none, and we believe that EirTrade is well positioned for growth and market share capture.”

Founded in 2010 by Ken Fitzgibbon, EirTrade offers global aviation asset managers, leasing companies, airlines, and other industry participants, a full suite of end-of-life solutions for aviation assets with expertise and a robust track record across multiple aeroengine and airframe models. With facilities in Ireland and Dallas, TX, EirTrade offers its partners a complete suite of services spanning from engine storage, disassembly, repair management, and parts trading with a focus on asset value maximization. As a result of its partnership with Acorn, EirTrade will enhance its leading consignment business with increased financial capacity to purchase aviation assets.

“We are thrilled to partner with Acorn,” said Fitzgibbon. “Their sector-focus and knowledge will be additive to EirTrade as we continue to stay at the forefront of industry trends and continue to grow our business with our current consignment partners, as well as through asset acquisitions on our own balance sheet.” 

Fitzgibbon continued by saying, “EirTrade is an innovative company that prides itself on firsts – we were the first aftermarket services company to manage the disassembly and monetization of a 787, an A380, as well as other aeroengine assets. We’ve had an amazing growth trajectory absent access to significant capital resources. Now with Acorn’s assistance, we can scale the business collaboratively with our existing partners, as well as on our own balance sheet, evaluating significantly larger asset opportunities.”

In addition to Mr. Fitzgibbon, the EirTrade team is led by Lee Carey, Karl Fitzgibbon, Paul Gleeson, and Redmond Walsh in Ireland, and Bill Thompson in the United States. 

“Having known Ken and his team for years, I am delighted to welcome them into the Acorn family,” said Adam Nemenyi, incoming Board member. “As a founder who also partnered with Acorn, I am confident that this partnership will prove to be a tremendous success. The shared values, culture, and ethics of both EirTrade and Acorn are perfectly complementary. I look forward to playing an active role in helping EirTrade execute its exciting multi-year strategic plan.”

Irwin Mitchell LLP served as lead legal counsel to Acorn. Philip Lee LLP served as lead legal counsel for EirTrade. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

About Acorn Growth Companies 
Acorn Growth Companies is a middle-market private equity firm focused exclusively on Aerospace, Defense, Space, and Intelligence. Acorn invests solely in operating companies that strive to enhance global mobility and protect national interests. Acorn has a formidable reputation in the industry and is recognized for its deep understanding of the Aerospace and Defense markets, with proprietary access to the best companies within these sectors. With operational expertise and its ability to lead and manage investments through variable economic and industry cycles, Acorn works in tandem with management to build its portfolio companies into significant market leaders.

About EirTrade Aviation
EirTrade Aviation is an aviation technical asset services and trading company with operations in Ireland and the United States.  Through a full suite of asset management offerings and end-of-life solutions for aeroengines and airframes, EirTrade optimizes asset value for its clients.  EirTrade has expertise and track record across a number of engine and airframe platforms including CFM56-5B/7B, V2500, CF6, A320, A330, A380, 737, and 787.

SOURCE Acorn Growth Companies

• New investment from EQT Life Sciences and OrbiMed with participation from existing investors
  
• MinervaX will hold financial reserves of more than €125 million, following the financing
  
• The financing supports the Company’s efforts to commence a Phase III clinical trial of its Maternal Vaccine against Group B Streptococcus

COPENHAGEN, Denmark, Oct. 11, 2023 — MinervaX ApS, a privately held Danish biotechnology company developing a novel, prophylactic vaccine against Group B Streptococcus (GBS), has today announced the completion of a EUR 54 million upsized financing. The financing includes investment from new investors EQT Life Sciences and OrbiMed, with participation from existing investors Novo Holdings, Pureos Ventures, Sanofi Ventures, Trill Impact Ventures, Adjuvant Capital, Wellington Partners, Industrifonden, Sunstone LifeScience Ventures, and LF Invest. Vincent Brichard of EQT Life Sciences and Tal Zaks of OrbiMed will join the MinervaX Board of Directors.

GBS is a leading cause of life-threatening infections in newborns as well as adverse pregnancy outcomes such as preterm delivery and stillbirths. Current prophylactic measures provide insufficient protection, meaning there is an urgent need to accelerate the development of a GBS vaccine. A video describing the unmet medical need for a GBS vaccine and details of MinervaX’s novel GBS maternal vaccine can be found on the Company’s website, here: https://youtu.be/HvkRJBqsjjY.

The Company is currently progressing two Phase II clinical trials in 470 pregnant persons across Denmark, United Kingdom, Uganda and South Africa. Initial data from these clinical trials are highly positive and demonstrate that the vaccine has an acceptable safety profile, is highly immunogenic and gives rise to functionally active antibodies. Details of MinervaX’s clinical trials can be found at clinicaltrials.gov under the identifiers NCT04596878 and NCT05154578. In addition to pregnant persons, MinervaX is also pursuing Phase I development of its novel GBS vaccine in Older Adults, under identifier NCT05782179.

This financing will enable MinervaX to progress its novel GBS vaccine towards Phase III clinical trials in 2024.

Per Fischer, CEO of MinervaX, said: “The addition of EQT Life Sciences and OrbiMed to our existing investor consortium further strengthens the Company’s resolve to advance our novel GBS vaccine towards Phase III clinical trials in pregnant persons. It also provides additional validation and recognition of the acceptable safety profile and strong data demonstrated in the Phase II clinical trials.  We are delighted to welcome Vincent Brichard and Tal Zaks to the board of directors, who will bring invaluable vaccine expertise as we continue to address the pressing need for the development of a novel vaccine to address the unmet medical burden of Group B Streptococcus.”

Vincent Brichard, Venture Partner EQT Life Sciences, commented: “EQT Life Sciences is thrilled to take an active part in the MinervaX prophylactic vaccine against GBS with the hope to save newborns’ lives. We are impressed by the clinical data achieved so far, the quality of the team and the near-term milestones enabling MinervaX to start a registration trial.”

Tal Zaks, Partner at OrbiMed, added: “We recognize the unmet need for better protection against GBS disease for vulnerable populations and the potential for MinervaX’s vaccine to provide best-in-class efficacy. I look forward to working with the MinervaX team to support the full development of this program.”

About MinervaX

MinervaX is a Danish biotechnology company, established in 2010 to develop a prophylactic vaccine against Group B Streptococcus (GBS), based on research from Lund University. MinervaX is developing a GBS vaccine for maternal immunization, and now also for vaccination of older adults, with Phase II data suggesting superior efficacy compared with other GBS vaccine candidates in development. The latter are based on traditional capsular polysaccharide (CPS) conjugate technology. By contrast, MinervaX’s vaccine is a protein-only vaccine based on fusions of highly immunogenic and protective protein domains from selected surface proteins of GBS (the Alpha-like protein family). Given the broad distribution of proteins contained in the vaccine on GBS strains globally, it is expected that MinervaX’s vaccine will confer protection against virtually 100% of all GBS isolates. www.minervax.com 

About Group B Streptococcus (GBS)

GBS is responsible for nearly 50% of all life-threatening infections in newborns. At any given time, some 15-25% of women are spontaneously colonized with GBS, and they run the risk of transmitting the bacteria to their child in the womb, during birth and/or during the first months of life. GBS colonization may lead to late abortions, premature delivery, or stillbirth and, in the newborn child, may result in sepsis, pneumonia or meningitis, all of which carry a significant risk of severe morbidity, long- term disability or death.

Currently, the only preventative strategy available involves the use of intravenously delivered prophylactic antibiotics which cannot comprehensively prevent GBS infection in utero and do not protect against late-onset infection in newborns. Not only is this approach expensive and logistically challenging, it fails to cover all, including the most severe cases in the US and Europe, and is rarely available in resource- limited settings. Finally, it carries the risk for increasing antibiotics resistance, a recognized worldwide health threat.

The development of a GBS vaccine is also endorsed by Group B Strep Support and Group B Strep International, and GBS has been prioritized by several public health organizations including the WHO. Both increased uptake of immunization among pregnant women and greater awareness of the implications of GBS suggest that a safe and effective vaccine targeting GBS would be well suited to address this unmet need.

About EQT Life Sciences

EQT Life Sciences was formed in 2022 following an integration of LSP, a leading European life sciences and healthcare venture capital firm, into the EQT platform. As LSP, the firm raised over EUR 3.0 billion (USD 3.5 billion) and supported the growth of more than 150 companies since it started to invest over 30 years ago. With a dedicated team of highly experienced investment professionals, coming from backgrounds in medicine, science, business, and finance, EQT Life Sciences backs the smartest inventors who have ideas that could truly make a difference for patients.

More info: www.eqtgroup.com

Follow EQT on LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram

About OrbiMed

OrbiMed is a healthcare investment firm, with approximately $17 billion in assets under management. OrbiMed invests globally across the healthcare industry through a range of private equity funds, public equity funds, and royalty/credit funds. OrbiMed’s team of over 100 professionals is based in New York City, San Francisco, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Mumbai, Herzliya, London and other key global markets.

More info: www.orbimed.com

SOURCE MinervaX

SINGAPORE, Oct. 10, 2023 — REPUBLIK, a global technology company building new ways for people to interact, proudly announces the successful conclusion of its $6 Million Seed funding round. The round saw participation from leading investors, including OKX Ventures, 6th Man Ventures, Arcane Ventures, CMS Holdings, Comma3 Ventures, Define Ventures, Enjin, FBG Capital, HTX Ventures, Mirana Ventures, Oracles Investment Group, Signum Capital, Sora Ventures, and UOB Venture Management. 

The capital raised is instrumental in building REPUBLIK’s platform and developing cutting-edge, web3 creator tools on the blockchain. Currently in beta across web app, iOS, and Android platforms, REPUBLIK has garnered substantial traction, empowering creators with new ways to interact and get rewarded for their contributions to the platform.

“For too long people have given their time, attention and creativity to existing platforms for almost nothing in return. REPUBLIK is going to change that by ensuring that the value of the community is fairly distributed. We’re excited to have investors who share in our vision and partners that are helping us build a true community-owned platform,” expressed Daniel He, REPUBLIK’s CEO.

Unlike traditional social platforms, where monetization options are fragmented and often come with high fees, REPUBLIK uses Web3 technologies to streamline the entire process, drastically reducing costs borne by Creators. This results in Creators keeping a significantly larger share of their earnings, but also enables a token-based reward system that allows everyone to earn for interacting with content, referring friends and supporting Creators.

While legacy platforms capitalize on user attention without direct compensation, REPUBLIK believes that online communities have great value, and that this value should be fairly distributed to the people who helped create it. As such, XP in the app represents how much value a user brings, while RPK will be a freely traded token representing the value of the community. The more XP a user has, the more RPK will be distributed to them.

The REPUBLIK App is available on Google Play Store, Apple App Store and on browsers as a web app at https://app.republik.gg/ 

About REPUBLIK

Singapore headquartered, with additional offices in Berlin and Los Angeles, Republik is on a mission to connect creators to their communities while rewarding everyone based on their interactions. With a rapidly growing community, REPUBLIK redefines the realm of online interaction.

Media Contact:
media@republik.io 

https://republik.gg
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SOURCE REPUBLIK