Groundbreaking truck parking service comes to Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin.

MARIETTA, Ga., Aug. 16, 2023 — TruckParkingClub.com, the largest and most innovative truck parking marketplace, connecting truckers across America to hosts with available parking locations, announces its free rest stop truck parking availability service is now in eight states across America at no charge to its Members.

TruckParkingClub.com, the AirBnB for trucking parking, is an application that helps drivers save time and fuel by providing instant access to available parking throughout the United States.

With today’s announcement, the company has opened up its network of 143 rest stops across eight states, including Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin, to over-the-road truckers looking for a safe, clean parking place.

Why is this important

The TruckParkingClub.com team has been driving nationwide to find more truck parking, driving 25,000 miles in 3 months while adding dozens of properties owned by businesses and investors. Interacting with truckers during the journey to grasp the challenges posed by the truck parking shortage resulted in the implementation of a complimentary rest-stop truck parking service.

“Having little awareness of truck parking availability in real-time is one of the biggest issues with truck parking today,” says Evan Shelley, CEO at TruckParkingClub.com.

TruckParkingClub.com is solving this decade-old issue by providing truckers with a real-time view of truck parking availability. Whether checking availability at a rest stop or reserving a parking space to drop a trailer, parking for multiple days, or making sure you stay within your hours of service, TruckParkingClub.com is dedicated to solving the parking accessibility problem for the broader trucking community.

“TruckParkingClub.com is proud to offer free rest stop truck parking availability services across eight integral states to help our nation’s truckers find legal parking,” said Shelley.

How it works

TruckParkingClub.com provides a web and mobile app for truckers to see parking availability and book a space at their desired location. The TruckParkingClub.com app currently includes real-time availability at 143 accessible rest stops and 120 premium parking locations with added services like overnight, multi-night and monthly stays, and reserved spaces.

By creating an account on the website at https://truckparkingclub.com/ or the mobile app, truckers can store their information for easy bookings in the future.

Property owners can list their parking sites on TruckParkingClub.com’s website or app by creating an account and answering a few simple questions. TruckParkingClub.com takes the owner’s unused space and turns it into truck parking. Typical property members on the platform include trucking companies, storage companies, tow truck companies, CDL schools, truck parking operators, real estate investors and more!

TruckParkingClub.com will announce new locations and new features in the near future.

For any questions with the TruckParkingClub.com website, users can call (888) 899-PARK or use the contact us page.

CONTACT: TruckParkingClub.com
(888) 899-PARK
[email protected]

SOURCE TruckParkingClub.com

• Marqo is an end-to-end multimodal vector search engine for developers that includes all the infrastructure to enable AI-powered real-time search at scale.
• New funding will support Marqo to scale its existing cloud service and build search technology that learns from user engagement to continuously improve relevance.

LONDON and MELBOURNE, Australia, Aug. 16, 2023 — Marqo, the startup enabling AI-powered search and discovery, has closed US$5.2million in seed investment. The investment, led by Blackbird Ventures, also includes the support of Creator Fund, January Capital, and Cohere’s co-founders, Ivan Zhang and Aidan Gomez. The funds will be used to develop a new form of vector search technology that continuously improves based on user engagement, which differentiates it from existing vector databases.

Marqo was founded by Jesse Clark, formerly Lead Scientist at Amazon Robotics AI and Principal Scientist at StitchFix and physicist at Stanford and UCL, and Tom Hamer, a former Amazon Web Services (AWS) software engineer. The team has since brought in AI, engineering, and operations expertise from Amazon, Uber and Goldman Sachs.

Unlike traditional keyword search, Marqo uses machine learning models to return more accurate search results by understanding content and meaning. Users can search using text, images, or a combination of both. The technology initially targets end-user search (ecommerce, marketplaces) but has applications in generative AI, analytics and security. The new service, currently in closed beta, allows the machine learning models to automatically learn from user engagement and continuously improve the relevance of the vectors.

“Search is in desperate need of modernisation – the vast majority of search experiences are based on legacy keyword search systems, which provide poor results,” said Marqo’s co-founder, Tom Hamer. “Customers want search experiences that anticipate their needs, not just match keywords. This is especially important for businesses where the search bar is the core product, such as ecommerce. By automatically improving based on user interaction, Marqo provides highly relevant results, and increases customer conversion rate, order value, and revenue.”

Marqo’s mission is to democratise AI technology allowing transformative search experiences to be built with ease. “Despite many advantages, vector search remains challenging to implement especially for applications requiring real-time search,” said Jesse Clark, Marqo’s co-founder. “Vector search is rapidly becoming a must have for generative AI applications. We want anyone to be able to leverage the latest machine learning models, even if they’re not an expert in this field.”

“Vector search is a huge growth area. In addition to being at the core of AI search and recommendation systems – vector search has become a must have component of generative AI. Marqo is instrumental in making AI useful to businesses by enabling developers to use the best technology with little effort,” said Aidan Gomez, CEO and co-founder of Cohere.

Blackbird Partner Nick Crocker added: “There is over 100 trillion gigabytes of data in the world, the majority of which is unstructured data such as text, images or video. With generative AI creating more content than ever before people, computers and companies need new ways to search. Marqo represents the next generation of search – hyper-relevant, AI-powered and based on human understanding. We are thrilled to be supporting this team!”

Marqo’s belief in democratising AI technology fuels its decision to open-source the core Marqo code, meaning it is free and available for anyone to use. For customers who want a solution that is optimised for production without any operational overheads, Marqo offers a fully managed, serverless Cloud Service. Following a highly successful early access program the Cloud Service is now open to the public, allowing anyone to sign up and start using Marqo in a few clicks. The continuous-learning vector search service is expected to be released later this year as a part of Marqo Cloud.

Links

About Marqo

Marqo is an end-to-end, multimodal vector search engine. With Marqo, users can easily implement AI-powered search, leveraging the latest machine learning models. With offices in Melbourne, London, and San-Francisco Marqo brings together a global team of experts across AI and machine learning, search analytics and engineering, to develop the next generation of search. Find out more at https://www.marqo.ai/ 

SOURCE Marqo

Canapi Ventures and Nexus Venture Partners lead round to help company meet demand for LLM solutions that can safely train on sensitive, internal data

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 16, 2023 — DynamoFL, Inc. today announced that it has closed a $15.1 million Series A funding round to meet demand for its privacy- and compliance-focused generative AI solutions. Coming off a $4.2M seed round, the company has raised $19.3M to date. DynamoFL’s flagship technology, which allows customers to safely train Large Language Models (LLM) on sensitive internal data, is already in use by Fortune 500 companies in finance, electronics, insurance and automotive sectors.

The round, co-led by Canapi Ventures and Nexus Venture Partners, also had participation from Formus Capital, Soma Capital and angel investors Vojtech Jina, Apple’s privacy-preserving machine learning (ML) lead, Tolga Erbay, Head of Governance, Risk and Compliance at Dropbox and Charu Jangid, product leader at Snowflake, to name a few.

The need for AI solutions that preserve compliance and security has never been greater. LLMs present unprecedented privacy and compliance risks for enterprises. It has been widely shown that LLMs can easily memorize sensitive data from its training dataset. Malicious actors can exploit this vulnerability to extract sensitive users’ personally identifiable information and sensitive contract values with carefully designed prompts, posing a major data security risk for the enterprise. The pace of innovation and adoption in the AI sector is punctuated by the rapidly changing global regulatory landscape, many of which require that enterprises detail these data risks, but enterprises today are not equipped to detect and address the risk of data leakage. In the EU, the GDPR and the impending EU AI act, along with similar initiatives in China and India, as well as AI regulation acts in the US, require that enterprises detail these data risks. However, today they are not equipped to detect and address the risk of data leakage.

More clearly needs to be done. As government agencies like the FTC explore concerns around LLM providers’ data security, DynamoFL’s machine learning privacy research team recently showed how personal information – including sensitive details about C-Suite executives, Fortune 500 corporations, and private contract values – could be easily extracted from a fine-tuned GPT-3 model. DynamoFL’s privacy evaluation suite provides out of the box testing for data extraction vulnerabilities and automated documentation to ensure enterprises’ LLMs are secure and compliant. 

“We deploy our suite of privacy-preserving training and testing offerings to directly address and document compliance requirements to help enterprises stay on top of regulatory developments, and deploy LLMs in a safe and compliant manner,” said DynamoFL co-founder Christian Lau.

“Privacy and compliance are critical to ensuring the safe deployment of AI across the enterprise. These are foundational pillars of the DynamoFL platform,” said Greg Thome, Principal at Canapi. “By working with DynamoFL, companies can deliver best-in-class AI experiences while mitigating the well-documented data leakage risks. We’re excited to support DynamoFL as they scale the product and expand their team of privacy-focused machine learning engineers.”

The company’s solutions help organizations privately fine-tune LLMs on internal data while identifying and documenting potential privacy risks. Organizations can choose to implement DynamoFL’s end-to-end suite or to implement their Privacy Evaluation Suite, Differential Privacy and/or Federated Learning modules individually.

DynamoFL was founded by two MIT PhDs who have spent the last six years researching the cutting-edge, privacy-focused AI and ML technology forming the basis of the company’s core offerings. The team balances expertise in the latest research in privacy-preserving ML, with researchers and engineers from MIT, Harvard and Cal-Berkeley, and experience in deploying enterprise-grade AI applications for Microsoft, Apple, Meta and Palantir, among other top tech companies.

“This investment validates our philosophy that AI platforms need to be built with a focus on privacy and security from day one in order to scale in enterprise use cases,” said DynamoFL CEO and co-founder Vaikkunth Mugunthan. “It also reflects the growing interest and demand for in-house Generative AI solutions across industries.”

“While AI holds tremendous potential to transform every industry, the need of the hour is to ensure that AI is safe and trustworthy. DynamoFL is set to do just that and enable enterprises to adopt AI while preserving privacy and remaining regulation-compliant,” said Jishnu Bhattacharjee, Managing Director, Nexus Venture Partners.”We are thrilled to have partnered with Vaik, Christian and team in their journey of building an impactful company.”

About DynamoFL, Inc.
DynamoFL is the world’s leading enterprise solution for privacy-preserving Generative AI. At DynamoFL we believe that prioritizing privacy, compliance and data security from day 1 while building Generative AI applications is the only way to responsibly scale AI and use it to augment human potential beyond what was thought possible. Our proprietary technology encapsulates state of the art optimization techniques for training and deploying Generative AI models along with a robust privacy training and evaluation suite incorporating paradigms like Federated Learning and Differential privacy to bring high performing end-to-end plug-and-play Generative AI to global enterprises.

About Nexus Venture Partners
Founded in 2006, Nexus Venture Partners is a venture capital firm that supports extraordinary founders in building product-first companies. The firm takes a high-conviction approach, serving as inception, seed, or series-A stage partner to founders, actively engaging with them throughout the company lifecycle. With $2.6 billion capital under management, Nexus focuses on two primary investment areas: enterprise software and AI companies globally and technology-powered businesses within India. For more information, visit https://nexusvp.com/

About Canapi Ventures
Canapi Ventures is a venture capital firm investing in early to growth-stage fintech companies. Our partners have been at the forefront of financial services innovation as operators, investors, bankers, advisors, and regulators. Our venture capital model connects high-quality fintech companies to our extensive network of banks and strategic partners. Canapi Ventures is advised by CenterHarbor Advisors and Canapi Advisors, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Live Oak Bancshares, Inc. (Nasdaq: LOB). For more information, visit http://www.canapi.com.

Media Contacts
Inkhouse for Canapi Ventures
[email protected]

SOURCE DynamoFL

Mitra Chem is developing a portfolio of Iron-Based Cathodes for Tier-1 Automotive and Energy Storage Supply Chains

Only U.S. Based Company Producing IRA Consumer Tax Credit Eligible Next Generation Iron-Based Cathodes

Funding will be Used for Investing in Accelerating Commercialization and Scaling Partnerships

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Aug. 16, 2023 — Mitra Future Technologies Inc. (“Mitra Chem”), a leading innovator in North American production of lithium-ion battery materials, today announced the completion of a $40 million first close of $60 million Series B funding round led by GM. The investment will fuel Mitra Chem’s mission to develop, deploy and commercialize U.S.-made iron-based cathode materials in an effort to enable mass-market electrification for electric vehicles, energy storage solutions, and beyond.

As part of the partnership with GM, Mitra Chem will develop iron-based cathode active materials (CAM) like lithium manganese iron phosphate (LMFP) to power affordable and accessible EV batteries compatible with GM’s EV propulsion architecture, the Ultium Platform. GM’s funding will enable Mitra Chem to scale its current R&D and pilot operations to expedite bringing their battery materials to market.

Mitra Chem has been at the forefront of battery technology research, focusing on developing sustainable and high-performance energy storage solutions.

• Mitra Chem’s proprietary technology and development process shortens the lab-to-market timeline by >90%.
• Mitra Chem is one of the only companies taking a multi-faceted approach by combining R&D, machine learning acceleration, and manufacturing to supply battery materials to OEM and battery cell customers.
• Mitra Chem’s battery R&D facility can synthesize and test thousands of cathode designs monthly, ranging in size from grams to kilograms – these processes drive significantly shortened learning cycles, enabling shorter time to market for new battery cell formulas.
• An “atoms-to-tons acceleration platform” powers Mitra Chem’s lab, using simulations and physics-informed machine learning models to accelerate formulation discovery, cathode synthesis optimization, cell-lifetime evaluation and process scale-up. The in-house cloud platform, purpose-built for battery cathode development, automates data ingestion across diverse synthesis, material characterization, cell prototyping and standardized analyses and visualizations.

Lithium-ion batteries are one of the key platform technologies enabling electrification in transportation, and consumer electronics, along with residential, commercial, and grid-scale energy storage. Mitra Chem is positioned to disrupt the global production and supply chain of these vital battery materials and revitalize the North American battery supply chain industry.

The passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) has supercharged demand for U.S.-made battery materials by offering consumer tax credits tied to domestically manufactured material usage. Mitra Chem is one of the only U.S.-based iron-based cathode manufacturers that enable purchasers of U.S.-made electric vehicles to qualify for the full suite of tax credits passed in the IRA.

The company today said it has additional requests for samples to cover the next year of production including nearly every global Tier 1 battery cell maker and multiple household name automotive OEMs.

“GM’s investment in Mitra Chem will not only help us develop affordable battery chemistries for use in GM vehicles but also will fuel our mission to develop, deploy and commercialize U.S. made, iron-based cathode materials that can power EVs, grid-scale electrified energy storage and beyond,” said Mitra Chem CEO and Co-Founder Vivas Kumar.

“This is a strategic investment that will further help reinforce GM’s efforts in EV batteries, accelerate our work on affordable battery chemistries like LMFP and support our efforts to build a North America-focused battery supply chain,” said Gil Golan, GM vice president, Technology Acceleration Commercialization. “GM is accelerating larger investments in critical subdomains of battery technology, like cell chemistry, components and advanced cell production processes. Mitra Chem’s labs, tools and talent will fit well with our own R&D team’s work.”

The growing strategic relationship with GM will enable Mitra Chem to leverage GM’s industry expertise and global reach, accelerating the development and commercialization of its iron-based cathode technology. The additional funding will go to scale current operations and support accelerating commercialization.

In addition to GM, other notable investors participating in the Series B funding round include incumbents such as Social Capital, Fontinalis Partners, Earthshot Ventures, The Keffi Group, Boutique Venture Partners, and new investors such as GS Futures, Bricks Capital Management, Zeon Ventures, Scribble VC, WovenEarth Ventures, Bonds Investment Group, and others. The involvement of these esteemed investors underscores the industry’s recognition of Mitra Chem’s groundbreaking technology and its potential to shape the future of battery energy storage with a focus on US-based production.

The involvement of both financial and strategic investors underscores the industry’s recognition of Mitra Chem’s groundbreaking technology and its potential to shape the future of battery energy storage with a focus on US-based production. In November 2021, the company completed a $20 million Series A round which was led by Social Capital and Chamath Palihapitiya along with Taiwanese industrialist Richard Tsai, Fontinalis Partners, Boutique Venture Partners, Integrated Energy Materials, and Earthshot Ventures.

About Mitra Chem
Mitra Chem is building the first North American lithium-ion battery materials product company that shortens the lab-to-production timeline by over 90%. Lithium-ion batteries are the key platform technology enabling electrification in transportation, consumer electronics, along with residential, commercial, and grid-scale energy storage. Mitra Chem’s first product category is iron-based cathodes for Western battery applications. Iron-based cathodes shift away from the use of elements such as nickel and cobalt, which are facing imminent supply crunches. Mitra Chem takes cathode products from lab to industrial scale faster than the competition by leveraging an in-house machine learning technology advantage to dramatically shorten the R&D timeline. The company’s goal is to transform the cathode from a specialty chemical to a platform technology that differentiates cell performance by end application.

About GM
General Motors (NYSE: GM) is a global company focused on advancing an all-electric future that is inclusive and accessible to all. At the heart of this strategy is the Ultium battery platform, which powers everything from mass-market to high-performance vehicles. General Motors, its subsidiaries and its joint venture entities sell vehicles under the Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, Cadillac, Baojun and Wuling brands. More information on the company and its subsidiaries, including OnStar, a global leader in vehicle safety and security services, can be found at https://www.gm.com.

SOURCE Mitra Chem

• Assembly Ventures has built the first transatlantic venture capital platform to invest in cutting-edge technologies in the mobility sector.
• Founded by trailblazers in the mobility sector with strong operational and investment credentials, this brings total assets under management on the platform to $94 million after closing.
• Substantial investment potential seen in mobility technologies is driven by a shift in Western industries’ and governments’ approach to rebalance their technological dependencies on China.
• Focused investment thesis validated by a broad range of top tier corporate investors, family offices, institutional investors, private investors and organizations of strategic relevance across the U.S. and Europe.

DETROIT, Aug. 16, 2023 — Assembly Ventures [“Assembly”], the first early-stage transatlantic venture capital platform investing in cutting edge technologies across the mobility sector, today announced the successful closing of their inaugural $76 million Assembly Ventures Fund I [“Assembly I” or “the fund”]. Focused on series seed, A and B investments, Assembly is committed to strategically supporting outstanding entrepreneurs driving transformative innovations across land, air, sea, and space.

The successful fundraise reflects Assembly’s strong credentials as a world-class team, guided by a focused investment philosophy and founded in 2020 by experienced mobility investors and operators Chris Thomas, Jessica Robinson, and Felix Scheuffelen.

Assembly recognizes substantial investment potential in the U.S. and Europe, especially in areas such as battery technology, clean energy solutions, climate tech, supply chain optimization, and automotive production. This is driven by a shift in many Western governments’ and industries’ approach to rebalance their technological dependencies, and as a result, the strengthening of public sector industrial policy to support critical investment.

Chris Thomas, co-founder and partner at Assembly Ventures said, “We believe that the world is on the cusp of a new geopolitical era where the West will increasingly choose to de-risk its heavy reliance on China. In the coming decades, we anticipate a radical reshaping of economies, especially in automotive and mobility technology across air, land, sea, and space, along with their respective supply chains. We look at the world through this lens to anticipate and identify which technologies are critical, unique, and capable of generating exceptional value for our investors. By strategically investing in these technologies, and helping our portfolio companies to scale, we aim to play a pivotal role in moving the world towards efficiency, sustainability, growth, and freedom.”

With $94 million in assets under management, Assembly has benefited from its unique position with access to dealflow and thought-leaders in the industrial and innovation capitals of the Western world, including Detroit, Silicon Valley, Berlin. With the successful closing of the fund, Assembly Ventures is in the process of opening an office in the German capital to advise on European investments.    

To date, it has announced several investments following their Mobility 4.0 thesis, including Metropolis Technologies, NAVIT, Our Next Energy (ONE), and Sortera.

“Selecting investors with a shared vision and values is one of the most important and foundational decisions a new company can make,” said Mujeeb Ijaz, CEO & Founder of ONE. “As an early-stage investor, Assembly Ventures has used their team’s business relationships, sector knowledge, and operations expertise to help ONE grow efficiently and scale its manufacturing ecosystem here in Michigan.”

Amidst a declining global venture market, which saw only 16 first-time funds secure new capital in Q1 2023 in the U.S. compared to 181 in 2022 and 363 in 2021*, the closure of this fund further underscores the Assembly team’s resilience. Despite weaker global economic growth, investors’ appetites for unique mobility technologies continue to grow, validating the firm’s investment strategy.

Assembly’s investors include strategic corporates such as Arbor Bancorp Inc., CRONIMET, MANN+HUMMEL, Renaissance Global Logistics, Stellantis Ventures, Vontier, and WF Whelan, and a long list of individual investors in the U.S. and Europe including Wolfgang Bernhart, Matt Cullen, Calvin Ford, Dan Gilbert (DVP), Philipp von Hagen, Joe Hinrichs, Karl Iagnemma, Jody Kelman, Tim Lalonde, Kathleen Ligocki, John Moavenzadeh, Stephen Polk, Tony Posawatz and Dug Song.  Additional leading strategic entities, a pension fund, and individuals with deep expertise in automotive, mobility, energy and infrastructure are also part of Assembly’s investor base.

*Source: Pitch Book & NVCA: Venture Monitor 2023 Q1.

For more info, visit www.assemblyventures.com 

Contact:
[email protected]  

Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2184073/Assembly_Ventures.jpg

SOURCE Assembly Ventures LLC

The report by the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs reinforces the importance of PledgeLA’s recent goal to help double the diversity in Los Angeles’ venture capital portfolios within five years.

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 15, 2023 — A new report from the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs that tracks investments made by LA-based venture firms connected to the Annenberg Foundation’s PledgeLA initiative found slight increases in funding to women and Black founders when compared with the previous year. However, there are still many gaps remaining, especially when it comes to check size and venture firms’ comparative assets under management.

From an analysis of 2022 investments made by 75 LA-based venture firms in 884 tech startups led by 1,663 founders and co-founders, the following insights emerged:

• In 2022, 30% of companies receiving investment were led by women, Black, and/or Latinx founders.
• However, these founders only received 4.6% ($6.4 billion) of the $139 billion invested in 2022.
• VC firms led by underrepresented minorities and those with a diversity thesis were almost twice as likely to back Latinx and women founders, and four times more likely to invest in Black founders.
• Traditional VCs had an average of $335M of assets under management (AUM), far exceeding VC firms led by underrepresented minorities ($53M), VC firms with a diversity thesis ($33M), or VC firms led by women ($17M).

“To meet the complex challenges of the 21st century, we must ensure access to capital isn’t a barrier to innovation,” said Noramay Cadena, PledgeLA Advisory Committee Member and Managing Partner of Supply Change Capital, who just closed a $40M debut fund. “It’s time to shift the paradigm around backing companies (and funds) led by women and people of color – not as a charitable activity, but as filling long-standing innovation gaps and creating new opportunities that are great for business.”

To help focus the LA venture ecosystem on closing these gaps, PledgeLA announced a new regional goal called “50 in 5” during LA #TechWeek in June. The goal seeks to drive 50% of all venture investments to companies led by women, Black, and Latinx founders by 2028 (up from the current level of 30%). While this will require nearly doubling the current number of such companies receiving funding, Los Angeles has long been a national leader in portfolio diversity. The peak year, 2020, showed 39% of all venture investments going to these founder segments.

“We’ve seen study after study highlight how women founders and founders of color are more efficient and impactful in returning more of that capital to investors,” said Annenberg Foundation Executive Director Cinny Kennard. “In an industry so driven by data, we look forward to seeing the future findings align with investment practices.”¹²

The 2023 report, completed by a research team led by Dr. Jasmine Hill at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, is the fourth in a series of reports on access to capital within PledgeLA venture firms. It remains the largest, most robust analysis of portfolio diversity in the Los Angeles tech ecosystem. Read the report here.

Beyond reports and regional goals, PledgeLA is deploying a new set of programs that focus squarely on access to capital. These include a new event series designed to connect LPs with underrepresented fund managers, plans for a new regional equity-based fund-of-funds, and an updated version of the initiative’s successful VC Internship Program that will help increase awareness of venture capital and startup investing at LA-area universities. The PledgeLA team has also collaborated with leaders in other tech hubs, and is currently working to support the launch of a New York City-based effort this fall.

PledgeLA is a coalition of more than 215 LA venture capital firms and tech companies working to increase equity, community engagement, and accountability among LA companies.

¹ Forbes, https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbesbusinesscouncil/2022/12/01/the-road-to-redemption-lets-get-more-women-funded/?sh=2745b1b01a25

² Bloomberg (Kauffman), https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-05/diverse-startups-raise-more-cash-and-return-more-to-investors

SOURCE PledgeLA

HOUSTON, Aug. 15, 2023 — Atlas Credit Partners (“ACP”), an asset management firm specializing in investing and partnering with businesses on a direct basis, today announced a $100 million strategic financing to AST SpaceMobile, Inc. (“AST”) (NASDAQ: ASTS), with approximately $50 million funded at closing. 

The ACP credit facility will provide AST with additional resources to continue building a globally connected satellite-based cellular broadband network directly accessible by standard mobile phones. Capital from the ACP facility will allow AST to reach its next commercial milestones, including satellite implementation and integration.

“We are thrilled to partner with Atlas Credit Partners as we continue to pursue our mission to eliminate the connectivity gaps faced by billions of people around the world,” said Sean Wallace, Chief Financial Officer of AST SpaceMobile. “Atlas Credit Partners’ financial commitment to us is an important part of our comprehensive financing plan.”

ACP’s investment builds upon AST’s existing capital base of approximately $800 million invested to date.  This investment, along with AST’s robust suite of proprietary technology, best-in-class manufacturing facilities, and existing partnerships with telecom industry leaders such as AT&T, Vodafone, and American Tower, will allow the Midland, TX-based company to further its goal of building a global satellite-based telecommunications network.

“The partnership recently announced with AST demonstrates ACP’s commitment to structuring flexible capital solutions for best-in-class companies. It’s a privilege to invest alongside so many global industry leaders and further position AST for long-term success,” said Drew Mallozzi, Chief Investment Officer and Managing Partner at Atlas Credit Partners.

To learn more, visit https://www.atlascreditpartners.com or https://www.ast-science.com. 

About Atlas Credit Partners
Atlas Credit Partners is a Houston, TX based asset management firm specializing in value-oriented investing and partnering directly with management teams, and other businesses in transition. The company has invested more than $850 million on behalf of its partners and stakeholders and is currently investing through multiple private credit vehicles. To learn more, visit https://www.atlascreditpartners.com, or follow the company on LinkedIn. 

About AST SpaceMobile
AST SpaceMobile is building the first and only global cellular broadband network in space to operate directly with standard, unmodified mobile devices based on our extensive IP and patent portfolio. Our engineers and space scientists are on a mission to eliminate the connectivity gaps faced by today’s five billion mobile subscribers and finally bring broadband to the billions who remain unconnected. For more information, follow AST SpaceMobile on YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Watch this video for an overview of the SpaceMobile mission.

Press Inquiries: 
Erika Siemasko
JMG Public Relations
212-206-1645
[email protected]

SOURCE Atlas Credit Partners

With Three-Year Revenue Growth of 415%, DataDome Ranks 1407 Overall Among America’s Fastest-Growing Private Companies

NEW YORK, Aug. 15, 2023 — DataDome, a leading provider of AI-powered online fraud and bot management, is proud to announce that for the second year in a row, it has made the Inc. 5000–the most prestigious ranking of the fastest-growing private companies in America–ranking 1407 overall.

“This achievement – for the second consecutive year – demonstrates the mission-critical value our solution delivers to businesses in the face of an ever-expanding online fraud landscape. In 2022 alone, we blocked more than 250 billion attacks,” says Benjamin Fabre, CEO of DataDome. “In a world where the increased sophistication of bots makes every company a potential target, DataDome is committed to debilitating fraudsters. We owe our success to each and every customer who trusts in the work we do to free the web of fraudulent traffic.” 

Today’s announcement comes on the heels of DataDome’s channel partner program expansion, as well as closing $42M in Series C funding to advance the fight against bad bot developers and online fraud. DataDome has received widespread recognition in the past year for its market-leading detection and mitigation capabilities. It is Great Place to Work certified, is a G2 leader in Bot Detection & Mitigation, and has won numerous industry awards.

“Running a business has only gotten harder since the end of the pandemic,” says Inc. editor-in-chief Scott Omelianuk. “To make the Inc. 5000—with the fast growth that requires—is truly an accomplishment. Inc. is thrilled to honor the companies that are building our future.”

DataDome’s solution assesses the intent of a visit in real time, every time, to detect and mitigate attacks on mobile apps, websites, and APIs with unparalleled accuracy and zero compromise. Such performance is made possible by the solution’s ability to adapt machine learning algorithms in real time, at the edge. DataDome protects 300+ enterprises from account takeover, scraping, payment fraud, DDoS, credential stuffing, and more.

Follow DataDome on YouTube and LinkedIn for regular updates on threat research, customer case studies, and to ensure your bot protection is ready to tackle the most sophisticated attacks.

Methodology 

Companies on the 2023 Inc. 5000 are ranked according to percentage revenue growth from 2019 to 2022. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by March 31, 2019. They must be U.S.-based, privately held, for-profit, and independent—not subsidiaries or divisions of other companies—as of December 31, 2022. (Since then, some on the list may have gone public or been acquired.) The minimum revenue required for 2019 is $100,000; the minimum for 2022 is $2 million. As always, Inc. reserves the right to decline applicants for subjective reasons. Growth rates used to determine company rankings were calculated to four decimal places.

About DataDome

DataDome’s bot and online fraud protection detects and mitigates attacks with unparalleled accuracy and zero compromise. Our machine learning solution analyzes 3 trillion data points per day to adapt to new threats in real time. Our 24/7 SOC experts protect hundreds of high-profile brands worldwide, including Rakuten and AngelList. A force multiplier for IT security teams, DataDome is fully transparent, easy to deploy, and frictionless for consumers. In 2022, DataDome was named a Strong Performer in the Forrester Wave: Bot Management and ranked the top G2 Leader in Bot Detection & Mitigation for Fall 2022, Winter 2023 and Spring 2023.

About Inc.

Inc. Business Media is the leading multimedia brand for entrepreneurs. Through its journalism, Inc. aims to inform, educate, and elevate the profile of our community: the risk-takers, the innovators, and the ultra-driven go-getters who are creating our future. Inc.’s award-winning work reaches more than 50 million people across a variety of channels, including events, print, digital, video, podcasts, newsletters, and social media. Its proprietary Inc. 5000 list, produced every year since 1982, analyzes company data to rank the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the United States. The recognition that comes with inclusion on this and other prestigious Inc. lists, such as Female Founders and Power Partners, gives the founders of top businesses the opportunity to engage with an exclusive community of their peers, and credibility that helps them drive sales and recruit talent. For more information, visit www.inc.com.

For more information on the Inc. 5000 Conference & Gala, slated for October 31 – November 2 in San Antonio, visit http://conference.inc.com/. 

SOURCE DataDome

PHOENIX, Aug. 15, 2023 — Trinity Capital Inc. (NASDAQ: TRIN) (“Trinity” or the “Company”), a leading provider of diversified financial solutions to growth-stage companies, today announced the commitment of $20 million in growth capital to MacroFab, the comprehensive manufacturing platform for building electronics from prototype to high-scale production.

MacroFab oversees an impressive network of more than 100 factories throughout North America. This infusion of capital follows their recent equity raise earlier this year of $42 million, led by Foundry and joined by BMW i Ventures, Edison Partners and ATX Venture Partners, bringing the total capital raised by the company to $102 million.

“We recognize the immense potential of MacroFab’s innovative platform to completely transform the electronics manufacturing landscape,” said Ryan Thompson, Managing Director, Tech Lending at Trinity. “We look forward to partnering with their industry-leading team to drive this next generation of technology forward.”

The company’s technology platform advances electronics manufacturing by streamlining operations, improving efficiency and offering unparalleled visibility into production. This investment will enable the company to further advance its platform, expand operations and accelerate revenue growth.

“This new financial partnership with Trinity signifies a bright and promising future for MacroFab,” said Phil Patman, Jr., Chief Financial Officer of MacroFab. “With support from Trinity Capital, we will continue to strengthen our position in the market and enhance our capacity to deliver cutting-edge solutions to electronics manufacturers of all sizes. Together, we are well-equipped to drive transformative change within the electronics manufacturing industry.”

About Trinity Capital Inc.
Trinity Capital Inc. (Nasdaq: TRIN), an internally managed business development company, is a leading provider of diversified financial solutions to growth-stage companies with institutional equity investors. Trinity Capital’s investment objective is to generate current income and, to a lesser extent, capital appreciation through investments, including term loans and equipment financings and equity-related investments. Trinity Capital believes it is one of only a select group of specialty lenders that has the depth of knowledge, experience and track record in lending to growth stage companies. For more information, please visit the Company’s website at www.trinitycap.com.

About MacroFab 
MacroFab operates the largest technology platform for electronics manufacturing, offering prototypes, high-volume production, and extended services through a network of over 100 factories across North America. Serving as a trailblazer in EMS manufacturing and digital supply chain solutions, MacroFab’s robust platform and marketplace foster efficient and expedient electronics production, bringing manufacturing closer to the end user. By leveraging AI-enabled sourcing opportunities, expert internal teams, and a user-friendly platform, MacroFab delivers unmatched efficiency and accessibility to the hardware tech community.

SOURCE Trinity Capital Inc.