CHICAGO, May 4, 2023 — The Chicago Venture Summit Future-of-Food, the flagship event of the region’s venture and startup community, which has garnered a national reputation as one of the premier venture conferences in North America, is bringing together over 1000 investors, founders, innovators, and corporate executives for three days of discussions and networking at 167 Green Street in Chicago’s Fulton Market District. The event, led by World Business Chicago, and opened by Chicago Mayor Lori E. Lightfoot, focuses on the future of food, a topic of growing importance in the global venture landscape.

“As we open the 2023 Chicago Venture Summit Future of Food, I am reminded of the limitless potential that exists within our city’s entrepreneurial ecosystem,” said Chicago Mayor Lori E. Lightfoot. “This summit is a testament to our unwavering commitment to supporting local startups and providing them with the resources they need to thrive. I am confident that the ideas and innovations that will be shared here over the next few days will continue to cement Chicago’s status as a global leader in food innovation and startup investment.”

The Chicago region has once again been confirmed to be not just the largest metro area for food production, but the leading hub for food bioengineering and production in the United States, according to the latest report published by the World Business Chicago Research Center today. The report features data from Pitchbook™ that highlights some 60% of Chicago-based startups receiving seed funding, since Q1 2022, have developed innovative food products utilizing biotechnology for food production. The World Business Chicago Research Center, Future of Food Issue 11, provides in depth coverage of the significant role Chicagoland plays in the innovation and production in the food industry.

“Since the first summit in 2014, our city’s flagship startup and venture capital conference has evolved to a premier global convening for startups, industry, and investors,” said Mark Tebbe, Innovation and Venture Council Chair of World Business Chicago. “Now as a sector-focused, multi-summit series, our Chicago Venture Summits continues to bring investors from around the world to explore significant investment opportunities and deals across Chicagoland.”

More than 1000 participants have registered to attend this year’s Chicago Venture Summit, representing more than 450 unique corporations, startups, financial and investment firms, universities, and other business and innovation ecosystem entities. This includes more than 100 financial, investment, and venture capital firms, and more than 20 countries represented via Consulate Generals, trade offices, and other international participants. The official Chicago Venture Summit startup portfolio includes 156 participating startups. 66% of startup portfolio companies are led by a founder of color. Nearly half of the startup portfolio companies are led by a female founder. 64% of the portfolio is headquartered in Chicagoland and Illinois, with 26% from outside-of-Illinois. This year’s startup portfolio includes the greatest representation of outside-of-Illinois startups, showing the global demand of the Chicago Venture Summit series.

Among the highlights of the Chicago Venture Summit, Future of Food 2023, include:

• Opening keynote by Alanna Cotton, President and Chief Business Officer for North America for Ferrero.
• Closing keynote by Kristin Kroepfl, Chief Marketing Officer for Quaker Foods North America.
• Keynote remarks by Hiroshi Shiragami, Chief Innovation Officer for Ajinomoto.
• Future-of-Startups Panel featuring Clever Carnivore, Dom’s Kitchen & Market, Forty Aces Fresh Market, Hyfe, and LatinxVC.
• Future-of-Markets Panel featuring Cooley, SWAT Equity Partners, and Supply Change Capital.
• Future-of-Corporate-Innovation Panel featuring DLA Piper, Edelman, Kraft Heinz, Mars Wrigley, and Microsoft.
• Greater Chicagoland Economic Partnership (GCEP) Remarks by Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle.
• A Chicago Food Pop-up led by Here Here Market.
• Partner events led by Naturally Chicago, Food Foundry, and Chicago startups Drip and FOODe.
• And the newest expansion to the Chicago Venture Summit experience: “Startup & VC Day” taking place a Life Time Work on Friday, May 5.

“The Chicago Venture Summit is the epitome of our unwavering commitment to diversity and inclusivity in economic development,” said Michael Fassnacht, CEO & President of World Business Chicago and Chief Marketing Officer of the City of Chicago. “With a record-breaking 156 innovative startups in this summit’s portfolio, nearly half of which are led by female-identifying founders and 66 percent led by founders of color, we’re proud to be leading the charge in creating a more equitable and inclusive future. This exceptional display of diversity and talent is a clear indication that our competitive advantage lies in uplifting and amplifying diverse voices and perspectives to drive innovation, growth, and expansion. As a global leader in food and agtech, we’re excited to continue pushing the boundaries of what’s possible and creating a brighter future for all.”

Chicago Venture Summit Future-of-Food is proud to announce the support of 53 unique sponsors, including valuable contributions from its presenting sponsors BMO, Cleveland Avenue, Cooley, Edelman, Ferrero, Mars Wrigley, Microsoft, Quakers Foods North America, and Shapack, without whom this premier event for food innovation would not be possible.

• “As we navigate the evolving food industry, entrepreneurship plays a critical role in its continued growth. Here in Chicago, we have the distinct advantage of being the center for innovation in the food and agriculture sector, an industry that BMO has been committed to supporting for generations,” said David Casper, U.S. CEO of BMO, and World Business Chicago board member. “Our partnership with World Business Chicago continues to drive progress in this vital industry and reinforces our dedication to supporting this thriving entrepreneurial community.”
• At Cleveland Avenue, we believe if you give entrepreneurs the support they need, amazing things will happen.  We are proud supporters of World Business Chicago and through the Chicago Venture Summit, we celebrate Chicago’s tremendous food community,” said Don Thompson, Founder & CEO, Cleveland Avenue, LLC, and World Business Chicago board member. “Chicago continues to lead the hospitality and food industry and is brimming with opportunity in every community – our team is committed to invest in and support these amazingly innovative entrepreneurs.”
• “With a long history of supporting leading-edge startups and venture investors across sectors and through many economic cycles, Cooley continues to see a bright future for innovative food and agtech companies.  We think this is particularly true in Chicago, as evidenced by this year’s Future of Food Summit being the biggest one yet,” said Laurie Bauer, co-founding partner and co-head of the corporate group for Cooley Chicago. “We are thrilled to part of Chicago’s thriving food and agriculture ecosystem. Supporting the Venture Summit is an opportunity for both the firm and the city to lead in this important sector.”
• “Edelman has been at the forefront of food and beverage innovation in Chicago for more than 70 years,” said Alison Borgmeyer, MS, RD, Chair US Food & Beverage for Edelman. “Innovation starts with each of us and we believe Chicago is the heart for creating systemic positive change in our food system.”
• “Ferrero is driven by the entrepreneurial spirit of our founders and continually seeks out opportunities to foster ingenuity in our communities,” said Alanna Cotton, President and Chief Business Officer for Ferrero North America, and World Business Chicago board member “That’s why we are thrilled to join World Business Chicago and bring the food startup community together, helping to further strengthen Chicago’s position as a place where new food companies and ideas thrive.”
• “At Mars Wrigley, we’re proud to have played role in helping to build the food capital of the world from the ground up. Chicago has been our home for over 100-years and we’re doubling down on our commitment to this great city with the opening of a brand new $40 million innovation center later this year,” said Fabiano Lima, Global Vice President for Corporate Affairs for Mars Wrigley, and a World Business Chicago board member. An investment that will create jobs and make Chicago our largest innovation hub in the world. Our commitment to the community doesn’t stop at our front door, though, we have cumulatively provided nearly $30M in funding to the Chicago community and will continue to invest including $1M this year alone.”
• At Microsoft, we are dedicated to using technology to revolutionize the food sector and make a positive impact,” said Nisaini Rexach, Head of Community Engagement for Microsoft in Chicago. “We are proud to be part of this journey with World Business Chicago with the Chicago Venture Summit series. As an presenting sponsor, we are thrilled to support World Business Chicago in this capacity.”
• “Quaker has over 100 years of history in Chicago and continues to thrive in this city thanks to its location and as a hub for talent in the food industry. As a result, we have delivered strong growth and innovation at Quaker,” said Robbert Rietbroek, General Manager and Senior Vice President of Quaker Foods North America, a subsidiary of PepsiCo, and World Business Chicago Board Member. “Quaker looks forward to connecting and collaborating with local entrepreneurs, innovators, and food industry experts at this year’s Chicago Future of Food Venture Summit.”
• “We are thrilled to host the Chicago Venture Summit Future of Food for the second consecutive year at 167 N Green, in Fulton Market District,” said Jeff Shapack, Founder and CEO of Shapack Partners and World Business Chicago board member. “As we navigate the challenges of sustainably feeding a growing global population, the summit serves as a vital platform for the future of the food industry. We look forward to hosting visionaries from around the world to the neighborhood. Fulton Market is synonymous with food and beverage, once a US hub of meatpacking and market produce and now one of the most desired destinations for restaurants and food innovation companies to share ideas, explore innovative solutions, and shape the future of food.”

World Business Chicago recognizes that the success of the Chicago Venture Summit Future-of-Food, the region’s flagship venture summit, is due in large part to the generous support of our partners and sponsors. Without their invaluable contributions, this event would not enjoy the national reputation it has as the premier convening of startups and investors in the food innovation industry. Innovation Sponsors include all seven members of the Greater Chicagoland Economic Partnership (GCEP): Cook County, Choose DuPage, Kane County, Kendall County, Lake County Partners, McHenry County Economic Development Corporation, and the Will County Center for Economic Development. Additional Innovation Sponsors include: 1871, College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, The Desire Company, GET Cities, Here Here Market, JLL, Midwest House, Savills, and SRS Acquiom. Startup Sponsor include: 2112 Creatives Industries Incubator, Chicagoland Food and Beverage Network, Clique Studios, Food Foundry, Grow Greater Englewood, Naturally Chicago, Illinois Science and Technology Coalition, Institute for Food Safety and Health of the Illinois Institute of Technology, Institute for Food Technologists, P33, S2G Ventures, and Valor Equity Partners. Venture Partners include: 81 Collection Fund, All Raise, BLCK VC, Bluestein Ventures, Chicago:Blend, Dom Capital Group, Founder Familia, HPA, Gen Z VCs, LatinxVC, Lofty Ventures, Serra Ventures, Supply Change Capital, Tilia, TMX, and VC Familia.

For the fourth time since 2021, the Chicago Venture Summit returns to 167 Green in Chicago’s Fulton Market District. The 640,000 square foot office building, developed by Shapack Partners and Focus and owned in partnership with Walton Street Capital, is a testament to its location and design. Recently, CCC Information Services, Foxtrot, and others have announced their headquarters’ relocation to the building, joining Kroll, WeWork and other innovative companies located at 167 Green in the Fulton Market District. 167 Green features one of Chicago’s largest town hall spaces, which doubles as a full-size basketball court on the top floor of the building, along with a rooftop terrace, sitting room, game room and gym.

As part of WBC’s mission to drive inclusive economic growth, a portion of the proceeds from this year’s Chicago Venture Summit will be donated to Don’s Chicago Dream, the Greater Chatham Initiative, and La Casa Norte. You can learn more about the Chicago Venture Summit Future-of-Food 2023 at www.ChicagoVentureSummit.com. Follow World Business Chicago on Twitter and LinkedIn for live updates from the summit.

ABOUT WORLD BUSINESS CHICAGO:
World Business Chicago serves a critical role in driving inclusive and equitable recovery throughout the city’s 77 neighborhoods, focused on high growth sectors: transportation, distribution, & logistics; manufacturing; healthcare & life sciences, and our local innovation, startup, & venture ecosystem. As the City of Chicago’s economic development agency, World Business Chicago leads corporate attraction & retention, workforce & talent, community impact, and promotion of Chicago as a leading global city. Supported by a council of 300+ local leaders, World Business Chicago’s portfolio of innovation & venture programs include: the Chicago Venture Summit series, Startup Chicago, ThinkChicago, and Venture Engine with the Illinois Science and Technology Coalition (ISTC).

SOURCE World Business Chicago

Investment will fuel adoption of the company’s signature OR Black Box^® technology, which is already used by leading academic healthcare centers across North America and Europe

TORONTO and NEW YORK, May 4, 2023 — Surgical Safety Technologies (SST), a medical technology company that engineered the OR Black Box® platform for hospitals, has today announced $15 Million in Series A funding. The round was led by U.S. Venture Partners and Santé Ventures, and will be used to accelerate the company’s automation initiatives and commercial efforts. SST’s platform leverages AI both to inform real-time decision making and provide analytical insight in the areas of safety, compliance and efficiency, which drastically improves patient outcomes and reduces hospital costs.

SST has nearly 60 employees across its Toronto and New York offices and operates with a single mission in mind: to make healthcare safer globally through improved knowledge of clinical practices. The company currently has its Black Box® platform and analytic products deployed in critical interventional hospital environments such as surgical operating rooms, trauma centers and simulation centers – powering better analytics, benchmarking and process improvement. The various Black Box technologies are in use within many of the leading academic healthcare providers in the United States, Canada, and Western Europe, and provide novel insights that result in reduced errors, improved safety, and significant cost savings.

“I am honored to have this support and confidence as we continue our mission of making healthcare safer and more cost-effective,” noted Teodor Grantcharov, founder of Surgical Safety Technologies. “Raising this round of financing offers incredible validation for our approach as a company, but most importantly, it helps get this technology into more operating rooms where it is needed most. There is more work yet to be done and we hope that our technology continues to play a direct role in saving many more lives in the future.”

Dafina Toncheva, General Partner at U.S. Venture Partners, adds that “USVP is thrilled to partner with SST as it grows its commercial footprint. SST’s novel enterprise software and analytic platform provides unique insights which are utilized by major hospitals across North America and Europe to improve patient outcomes and increase operating efficiency. It is our expectation that every hospital will need SST’s solutions for continuous improvement in surgical, trauma and interventional procedural outcomes to compete effectively and to secure accreditation in the future.”

Clinical studies have demonstrated that use of the OR Black Box® platform significantly improves compliance to standard operating procedures (such as the World Health Organization’s surgical safety checklist) as well as clinical performance, and has resulted in dramatic reduction of never events and improved patient safety outcomes. Initial results have also demonstrated opportunities for significant cost reductions as a consequence of equipment standardization, and data-driven scheduling and OR utilization.

“We are pleased to support SST and bring their extraordinary technology into more operating rooms across the country,” noted Dennis McWilliams, partner at Santé Ventures. “We have been following a number of companies in this space, and found SST to be a leader in both technology and business model given their unique value proposition to hospital systems. Surgical Safety Technologies is developing the operating room of the future, with products that are consistent with Santé’s mission of investing in health technologies making meaningful patient impact.”

For more information about SST and how the company is improving surgical outcomes for patients across the world, please visit www.surgicalsafety.com.

About Surgical Safety Technologies
Surgical Safety Technologies Inc. (SST) is a mission-driven organization that utilizes disruptive technologies to make healthcare safer globally. SST is the developer of The Black Box platform for healthcare and a suite of software and analytic products, necessary for continuous quality improvement and delivery of value-based care. SST’s products have been deployed in the leading healthcare centers in North America and Europe and high-quality evidence has demonstrated their effectiveness in reducing costs and improving patient outcomes. More information can be found at www.surgicalsafety.com.

About US Venture Partners
U.S. Venture Partners (USVP) is a leading Silicon Valley venture capital firm, partnering with entrepreneurs to transform their ideas into world-changing companies. USVP has invested in over 500 companies spanning four decades, including: Arkose Labs, Box, Carrot Fertility, Cato Networks, Check Point Software, Guidewire, Happy Returns, HeartFlow, HotelTonight, Human Interest, Imperva, Inari Medical, Inspire Medical Systems, Intersect ENT, Kenna, Medigate, Omada Health, Pluto TV, Standard Bariatrics, ThreatMetrix, Trunk Club, Trusteer, Yammer and Zerto. USVP focuses on early-stage start-ups that transform cybersecurity, enterprise software, consumer and healthcare. The USVP team consists of former entrepreneurs, technologists, corporate executives, and financial professionals who assist with strategy, scaling, team building, product development, and business development. USVP is based in Menlo Park, California. More information can be found at www.usvp.com.

About Santé Ventures
Founded in 2006, Santé Ventures is a specialized healthcare and life sciences investment firm with roughly $800M in capital under management. The firm invests in early-stage companies developing innovative new medical technologies, biotechnologies, and digitally enabled healthcare services. Recent Santé successes include Farapulse (Boston Scientific), Claret Medical (Boston Scientific), TVA Medical (Becton Dickinson), Millipede Medical (Boston Scientific), Molecular Templates (MTEM), AbVitro (Celgene), and Explorys (IBM Corp). Santé invests nationally and has offices in Austin, TX, and Boston, MA. For more information, please visit www.sante.com.

Media Contact
Ryan Walker
R.J. Walker & Co.
[email protected]

SOURCE Surgical Safety Technologies

Submitted claims are now under review and smart contracts will begin to be signed as claims are approved

LOS ANGELES, May 4, 2023 — The XPLA Blockchain, a next generation of Web3 mainnet developed with gamers at the core of its design, today announced it is in the final stages for the relief fund for $XPLA holders with tokens frozen due to the FTX situation.

The relief fund was unanimously approved by a community vote in January. $XPLA holders had until April 19, 2023, to submit claims for review. The review process included comparing submitted documentation to the records maintained by Kroll for the FTX incident. Once reviews are approved – contracts for $XPLA holders will be issued. 

“XPLA is the first blockchain to support its individual holders concerning the FTX incident by offering practical support. Several blockchain projects attempted to support its holders after the FTX incident, but unfortunately, none of the projects led to actual compensation. Team XPLA will continue our effort to make our holders whole again and to expand our ecosystem in a stable manner. Our team believes that we can set a positive example throughout the Web3 industry.” stated XPLA Leader Paul Kim. “From the vote to establish this fund through the actual support to holders will be less than six months – our team has seen how important this effort is to the community and we wanted to provide relief quickly.”

The relief fund includes a total of 19,600,000 $XPLA which was transferred to the Relief Fund Support Contract assigned from the Reserve Wallet. The legal process for submitting claims ran from April 7 – 19, 2023. XPLA is the first blockchain to develop and approve a Relief Fund for individual holders concerning the FTX incident.

About XPLA

XPLA is a global Mainnet encompassing NFT marketplace, metaverse, and entertainment. The XPLA ecosystem exhibits various DApps and protocols that facilitate the seamless Web3 adoption through XPLA GAMES, an all-in-one blockchain gaming platform and X-PLANET, the NFT marketplace which showcases games, entertainment, and digital art to the global Web3 market. To date, several games have been successfully brought onboard to the XPLA Mainnet, and more Web3 games including Summoners War: Chronicles, Ace Fishing: CREW, as well as  MiniGame Party are scheduled to join in 2023. XPLA is run by a network of global Web3 project teams, including YGG, Cosmostation, Ozys, 0x&, Animoca Brands, and Dexlab along with Com2uS Group.

For more information, please visit https://xpla.io

MEDIA CONTACT:

M Group Strategic Communications
[email protected]

SOURCE XPLA

LONDON, May 4, 2023 — OpenTrade has raised an oversubscribed funding round led by Sino Global Capital, with participation from other leading Web3 organizations including Circle Ventures, Kronos Research, Kyber Ventures, Polygon Ventures, and Outlier Ventures.

OpenTrade’s platform will provide users seamless access to a suite of on-chain structured financial products that are backed by investment grade, liquid financial assets. It is secured using time-tested, bankruptcy remote legal structures that ensure investors are fully protected off-chain, while allowing them to continue to operate entirely on-chain.

OpenTrade’s initial products will include liquidity pools for U.S. Treasury Bills, investment grade commercial paper, and investment grade supply chain finance. The supply chain finance products embed USDC payments and financing directly in B2B networks and platforms to make internet-native, on-demand financing available to businesses of all sizes from a global network of non-bank liquidity providers.

OpenTrade was founded earlier this year by a team of blockchain, engineering, and finance veterans, including Dave Sutter and Jeff Handler, previously of Centre, the consortium founded by Circle and Coinbase to provide standards governance for USDC, Tom Niermann, formerly of Google and Meta, Michael Harte, former COO/CIO at Barclays and Santander and Michele Biscelgia, previously a Partner at AGFE.

OpenTrade’s founding team’s collective experience across Web3, stablecoins, and traditional finance prompted them to work towards building a platform that could serve the evolving needs of Web3 businesses, funds, and investors, who need access to on-chain investments that earn stable, predictable returns, and global supply chains that need access to non-bank financing options.

As part of the company’s formation, OpenTrade’s co-founder Michele Bisceglia and advisor Steve White launched a new dedicated structured finance and investment advisory firm, Five Sigma, that has been spun out of AGFE to manage all of OpenTrade’s ‘off-chain’ operations. Five Sigma has retained a fully staffed team of experienced financial professionals, and currently has over $700M USD in assets under management. Working with Five Sigma allows OpenTrade to function as DeFi’s first truly vertically integrated platform for on-chain investments into tokenized real-world financial assets, which drives lower costs for end-users and allows OpenTrade to dynamically originate, underwrite, and structure products across a wide variety of asset classes.

OpenTrade’s DeFi protocol is built on Circle’s payments infrastructure, runs on Polygon and Ethereum, and is established on widely accepted open-source standards and battle hardened technology infrastructure that has supported trillions of dollars in on-chain transactions. The use of composable and programmable dollars like USDC lowers costs, complexity, and risk across the entire transaction lifecycle for both investors and borrowers.

OpenTrade will leverage the funds from this funding round to scale its operations, and plans to launch in the second half of this year.

“Thrilled to back the OpenTrade team as they build the necessary infrastructure to bring real-world financial assets onto the blockchain.  In the next decade, we expect that a majority of assets will be brought onto public blockchains.  OpenTrade is leading this paradigm shift and we look forward to being day one customers.” – Ian Wittkopp, Sino Global Capital, Head of Investment

“OpenTrade is a team that has identified real use cases where the utility value of USDC and DeFi can drive broader usage of these technologies across global supply chains and finance providers. We are excited to invest in OpenTrade as they help unlock the utility value of USDC in structured and supply chain finance.” – Wyatt Lonergan, Head of Circle Ventures 

“We see that the tokenization of real-world financial assets as a key growth area across DeFi now and moving forward, and believe that the combination of OpenTrade’s experienced team, unique operating mode, and strong product / tech capabilities positions them to become a leader in this promising area.” – Jason Brannigan, General Partner at Kronos Ventures

“The growing trend of tokenizing real-world assets (RWAs) is opening up new possibilities for generating yield as the lines between decentralized finance (DeFi) and traditional finance (TradFi) become increasingly blurred. The future of institutional DeFi relies on the development of on-chain structured financial products that can bridge the gap between these two worlds. OpenTrade, with its experienced team and proven track record, is well-positioned to lead the next wave of DeFi innovation, and we are excited to support their mission.” – Loi Luu, Chairman, Kyber Ventures

About OpenTrade

OpenTrade is an enterprise grade treasury management platform that provides seamless access to a suite of on-chain structured financial products backed by investment grade, liquid financial assets. This provides Web3 institutions, businesses, and investors the ability to preserve capital, maintain liquidity, and earn stable, predictable returns that are uncorrelated to crypto price volatility, all while ensuring they can continue to operate entirely on-chain. The company was launched out of stealth in February 2023 and has operations in both London and Palo Alto.

For more information, please visit the OpenTrade website at: https://www.open-trade.io/

SOURCE OpenTrade

Funding round led by fintech-focused growth equity firm Ten Coves Capital brings total raised to date to more than $43 million

NEW HAVEN, Conn., May 4, 2023 — Inbox Health, a leading patient billing communications platform, announced today that it has completed a $22.5 million Series B financing round, bringing total capital raised to more than $43 million since inception. The Series B was led by Ten Coves Capital with participation from existing investors including Commerce Ventures, CT Innovations, Vertical Venture Partners, Healthy Ventures, and Fairview Capital.

Today, more than 2,600 medical practices across the U.S. rely on Inbox Health, and more than 3.5 million patients have used the platform to pay a healthcare bill. The Series B announcement follows news that Inbox Health’s billing technology was awarded a patent by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in April 2023.The new growth capital will further accelerate Inbox Health’s strategic growth as it continues to improve and modernize the billing, support, and payment experience for even more patients and healthcare organizations.

Inbox Health’s data-driven platform makes it easy to automate and personalize patient billing communications, modernizing long-standing industry norms of 30/60/90-day paper statement billing cycles. Patients can receive easy-to-understand medical bills via their preferred communication channel with convenient payment and support options like text, email, and live chat. This patient-first billing experience removes ambiguity around an often-complex component of the healthcare system and provides an efficient way for medical practices to manage patient collections.

Inbox Health’s platform manages billions of dollars in patient care by leveraging its growing suite of proprietary integrations with various practice management and electronic health record systems. This facilitates communication between practices, patients, and billing teams. Such flexibility allows Inbox Health’s software to seamlessly manage multiple practice groups from a single portal.

“It’s tremendous to see the impact our team has been able to have on the patient experience of millions of people over the last few years,” said Blake Walker, co-founder and CEO of Inbox Health. “It’s humbling to recognize the number of patients who still struggle with frustrating billing experiences and see how many providers and billers continue to navigate inefficient workflows. We have an opportunity to use this funding to magnify our impact and reach millions more patients, and that is motivating for our team.”

Billing companies and practices utilizing Inbox Health’s platform benefit from a data-driven approach that engages patients in a more efficient way, resulting in stronger financial results.

“Inbox Health has built a mission-critical solution addressing a large and growing pain point within the healthcare payments space, thereby bringing modern and efficient solutions to millions of patients and thousands of providers,” said Steven Piaker, Managing Partner at Ten Coves Capital. “We believe that Inbox Health’s leading solution delivers tangible value to all key players in the patient care process and are excited to partner with the Inbox Health team during its next phase of growth.”

As part of the investment, Piaker is joining the Inbox Health Board of Directors.

About Inbox Health
Inbox Health directly addresses one of the fastest-growing problems in healthcare—the challenge of patient A/R. Built for medical billers, Inbox Health automates patient billing and patient payments and modernizes the patient support experience. Inbox Health improves patient engagement by providing clear medical bills immediately after service, choice of payment methods and communication channels, and fast, empathetic support through the phone and live chat. By improving the patient experience, billers see an increase in profitability, cash flow, and collection speeds. With Inbox Health, billing companies report a 60% increase in collection speeds in the first 60 days. Inbox Health provides billing companies an automated, streamlined platform that saves time, reduces paper statement costs, and results in fewer patient phone calls. Inbox Health currently serves over 2,500 healthcare practices and has supported over 3.5 million patients. Headquartered in New Haven, Conn., Inbox Health was recently named to the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies in America. More information can be found at www.inboxhealth.com.

About Ten Coves Capital
Ten Coves Capital backs high growth B2B software companies across the FinTech ecosystem where its capital, network, and decades of experience can help accelerate growth and value creation. Investing across payments, banking & lending, asset management, capital markets, and insurance & benefits (among other segments), the Ten Coves team has helped scale 40+ companies that are solving industry pain points, enabling workflows, and providing critical infrastructure to the largest financial institutions down to SMBs. For more information, visit tencoves.com.

SOURCE Inbox Health

JERUSALEM and NEW YORK, May 4, 2023 — Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP), a leading Venture Capital fund, today announced that it is expanding its team in New York, welcoming Shlomi Hagai as Partner and Head of the international JVP Cyber-Climate-tech center in NYC.

Shlomi brings over 25 years of experience as a CEO and CFO of leading fast-growing international technology companies, and we have the privilege of working with him in some of the JVP portfolio companies.

For the past 4 years, Shlomi was the group CFO of Contentsquare a French -US – Israeli global leader in digital experience analytics, which has hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue, and its AI-powered platform provides rich and contextual insight into customer behaviors, feelings, and intent.

Shlomi will be working closely with JVP’s scaleup companies, as they are building their marketing and Sales organizations in New York and become international market leaders.

Erel Margalit, Founder and Executive Chairman of JVP and Margalit Startup City said, “We are excited to welcome Shlomi Hagai as our new Partner to lead the JVP New York office and to spearhead our international cyber-climate-tech center in NYC. JVP partners and the senior management team wish Shlomi great success in his new role and look forward to continuing to build together global market leaders on the West, East Coast, and internationally”.

Commenting on his new role, Shlomi Hagai said: “I am grateful to Erel for the great opportunity to join one of the leading funds in the world.  After spending 25 years working in international technology companies, I am eager to embark on a new venture with JVP. I have a longstanding relationship with many of the JVP partners and the team. JVP is home to companies from Israel, and with New York serving as a crucial hub for the global market, I find this opportunity incredibly thrilling. My aim is to drive JVP towards significant growth and profitability, to strengthen our presence in the ecosystem, provide support to our portfolio companies that are based in New York, and identify new investment opportunities.”

About JVP:
Founded in 1993 by Dr. Erel Margalit, JVP is an internationally renowned VC fund. It is among the pioneering firms of the Israeli VC industry and has raised over $1.75bn and invests in companies in the early and growth stages. Over the years, JVP has built over 160 companies and has been listed numerous times by Preqin, as one of the top six consistently performing VC firms worldwide with portfolio companies that drive global markets today. JVP’s winning strategy combines company creation with early and late-stage investment.

JVP has been instrumental in building some of the world’s largest companies to emerge, orchestrated dozens of industry acquisitions to leading international companies including IPOs on NASDAQ in the areas of communication, cyber, AI & enterprise, fintech, including CyberArk ($5.5 billion), Qlik ($2.5 billion), Netro ($5.5 billion), Chromatis ($4.8 billion), Cogent ($2.5 billion). The core areas of the fund’s investments are Cyber, Enterprise & AI, Fintech & Insurtech, and Foodtech & Agtech, now adding ClimaTech.Over the past decade, JVP has spearheaded the creation of international Centers of Excellence, including the AI and Media Center in Jerusalem, the Cyber Center in Beer Sheva, the FoodTech Center in the Galilee, the Digital Health Center in Haifa, the Fintech Center in Tel Aviv and the International Cyber and Climate-tech Center in NYC.  Visit the JVP Website https://www.jvpvc.com.

 Photo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2069632/JVP.jpg

SOURCE JVP

The round included participation from Fin Capital, Great Oaks, Mantis, WndrCo, Ethos and Jaws

NEW YORK, May 4, 2023 — Setscale, a fintech startup revolutionizing purchase order financing for SMBs, today announced it has raised a $9.5M seed funding round, as well as secured up to $70M in debt.

The company’s CEO and Founder, Daniel Fine, saw the opportunity for Setscale after he and his team built a nine-figure business, but left millions in orders on the table due to lack of funding options for small businesses. With this new endeavor, the Setscale team aims to mitigate this issue for SMBs by providing alternative financing options that enable them to scale. Round participants include Fin Capital, Great Oaks, Mantis, WndrCo, Ethos and Jaws along with executives and founders from top Fintech and SaaS companies.

Banks have nearly always underserved SMBs and the fallout from Silicon Valley Bank has put more strain on this issue. Setscale provides a flexible alternative, enabling companies to fulfill existing and forward demand through an underwriting model intended to help companies scale. Rather than relying on traditional and legacy institutions, SMBs can use Setscale independently or in partnership with existing capital to fund their inventory and purchase orders.

Coming out of stealth, Setscale’s leadership team is rounded out by Jesse Roth, Chief Business Officer and General Counsel, Tami Mohney, Chief Strategy Officer, Don Renyer, Chief Product Officer, and Tim Bjorkman, Chief Technology Officer.

“As a business owner, I’ve experienced the struggles of financing purchase orders first-hand,” said Fine. “There’s clearly a need for more financing options for companies that might be overlooked by legacy financial institutions, even though there is market demand for their products. This is a critical time for companies to understand how and from where they will access capital – it’s an exciting challenge and with the support of our partners, our team is poised to help product-based companies thrive and meet consumer and B2B demand.”

Setscale will use the funding to expand its current tech offerings, continue building out its team, and double down on marketing efforts. The debt facility enables Setscale to deploy capital to its partners to finance product purchases from credit worthy end buyers.

“We are committed to supporting repeat founders and Daniel’s vast experience in many business endeavors gives him a unique perspective on what business owners need, especially in this challenging climate,” said Logan Allin, Founder and Managing Partner of Fin Capital. “Setscale’s innovative approach to purchase order financing is exactly the type of B2B fintech Fin Capital is excited about, bringing scalability to businesses.”

Setscale has helped companies across the CPG, ecommerce, health and wellness, medical and manufacturing spaces, enabling transactions for dozens of entities.

To learn more about Setscale, please visit https://setscale.com/

About Setscale:
Setscale is a fintech startup solving the trade financing dilemma for small businesses. Small businesses frequently get purchase orders, but don’t have the money to fill them. Through its PO financing technology, Setscale finances the cost of those goods, allowing small businesses to focus on product and sales, enabling them to scale. Setscale is an ideal partner for SMBs, coming in where traditional financial institutions won’t, enabling SMB’s to finance their growth. Setscale funds supply. You meet demand.

SOURCE Setscale

MILWAUKEE, May 4, 2023 — EVEN is on a mission to build equity in the music industry by empowering Artists and Fans to invest in each other. EVEN allows Artists to sell their music directly to fans before uploading their music on streaming platforms. In turn, Fans are rewarded like never before with access to exclusive content, merch, tour tickets, and one-of-a-kind experiences with their favorite Artists.

EVEN believes there needs to be a shift to the existing paradigm for emerging and established talent, particularly Black and Brown artists to earn their fair worth for their contributions to the music industry. “I’m encouraging artists to go through EVEN and use their system because as an artist, people should buy your art from you.” – LaRussell. EVEN’s MVP artist launch with Hip Hop artist LaRussell resulted in approximately $100,00 in revenue and a + 2000% increase in his overall streaming revenue. To put it into perspective, on streaming platforms, an artist would typically need over 200,000 fans per month to generate $5,000 in revenue. Built on the Blockchain technology, EVEN ensures that artists and their teams are paid immediately and transparently after each transaction.

“We are excited to champion EVEN’s vision to capsize the music industry and thrilled to be leading their seed round investments. EVEN has built an elegant solution connecting artists with fans in a direct and profitable way for all parties,”- Steve Mech, CSA Partner. EVEN has raised a $2.2Million seed round led by CSA partners with participation from a diverse group of investors including gener8tor, VC414, gAngels, Daniel Rotman, Adie Akuffo-Afful, Donte Murry, and Ogo.

“At EVEN, we are passionate about evening out the playing field for Artists and Fans. Artists should be able to earn fairly for their artistic contributions, and OG Fans should not be edged out of concert tickets and access to their favorite artists. With our new funding, we will be accelerating our platform with innovative tools to connect and build authentic community between artists and fans,” – Mag Rodriguez, EVEN, Founder & CEO.

The Future of Music is EVEN
EVEN was founded on two simple but powerful beliefs: Artists should be paid fairly for the music they create, and Artists and Fans should have a direct connection. We believe that Artists and Fans want to be connected in inspiring ways, and this is the foundation of EVEN’s mission and how we build technology to support these communities.

New Product Features to include:

• EVEN Chat, an on-platform destination for Artist-to-Fan communication but also fan-to-fan communication. Currently in Beta
• EVEN Fan Connect, a tool allowing Artist teams to send SMS and email notifications directly to fans on EVEN. Currently in Beta

Following EVEN’s beta launch projects with: French Montana, Destin Conrad, Kota the Friend and Xavier Omar, the future of music at EVEN is even more exciting with Spring & Summer music launches and partnerships to include:

• Grammy nominated Artist, Omarion
• Grammy nominated Artist, Jidenna
• Emerging Artist, femdot.

EVEN will be launching over 600 artists before the end of the year, with a current waitlist of 4,000+ artists.

Media Contact: Tomi Talabi, [email protected], +19174952484

SOURCE Even

MENLO PARK, Calif. and BIRMINGHAM, Ala., May 4, 2023 — Oak Hill Capital (“Oak Hill“) has committed $150 million in primary capital to Lit Communities (“Lit”) to further fund and accelerate the construction of Lit’s fiber-based network in unserved and underserved communities across the United States. Lit’s existing shareholders, including Stephens Capital Partners (“Stephens”), The Pritzker Organization (“TPO”) and the Lit management team, are all remaining shareholders and plan to continue to support the business going forward.

Lit was founded in Birmingham, AL, in 2019 and leverages public-private partnerships with local governments and municipalities to build and operate last-mile fiber networks. The company now has networks in place, under construction or in planning in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Texas.

“Lit Communities is already in a strong position with the backing from Stephens and TPO – their experience in the industry and understanding of our model has been paramount in our success to date.  We’re thrilled to partner with Oak Hill to further strengthen our position by benefiting from their long-standing experience and expertise in our space,” said Brian Snider, Chief Executive Officer at Lit. “I could not be prouder of the Lit team; they are what truly sets us apart. The future is extremely bright at Lit.”

“This is a pivotal point for our company,” said Andrew Massey, Chief Financial Officer for Lit. “We’ve spent years developing an expertise in collaboratively working with local governments and municipalities to determine where and how to efficiently build networks. The Oak Hill investment provides us the capital and expertise to accelerate our plans of providing ultra-fast, reliable, and affordable broadband service in the communities we partner with and serve.”

In partnership with local communities and vendors, Lit has successfully built and currently operates fiber networks reaching approximately 20,000 homes and businesses. Oak Hill’s investment will enable Lit to bring state-of-the-art, high-speed fiber-to-the-home networks to more than 200,000 locations over the next few years. Oak Hill is an experienced investor in broadband expansion through fast-growing, independently owned networks in multiple states. “We are thrilled to be partnering with Brian and his talented team, alongside Stephens and TPO, to support the expansion of Lit’s fiber network to many more underserved American communities,” said Adam Hahn, Principal at Oak Hill. “We believe that reliable, high-speed access to the Internet is fundamental to driving economic growth and equal opportunity in local communities across the country,” added Jeff Butler, Vice President at Oak Hill.

Bank Street Group LLC served as exclusive financial advisor and Latham & Watkins LLP and Maynard Nexsen served as legal counsel to Lit Communities and existing equityholders in connection with this transaction. Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP served as legal counsel to Oak Hill.

About Lit Communities

Lit Communities provides a full, turnkey solution for building broadband infrastructure in communities of all sizes, enabling them to create digital equity for their residents, businesses, and municipalities. We partner with real estate developers, municipal, county, and other governmental entities, as well as a variety of private partners to deploy last-mile fiber optic network infrastructure. Our networks also support a wide variety of other services in addition to internet, including but not limited to voice, telehealth, home security, home automation, small cell, DAS, and wireless backhaul, and public safety applications. For more information, please visit www.litcommunities.net.

About Oak Hill Capital

Oak Hill is a longstanding private equity firm focused on the North America middle-market. Oak Hill is a specialist, theme-based investor dedicated to investing in the following industry sectors: Media & Communications, Industrials, Services, and Consumer. The Firm implements a highly systematic approach to theme development, proactive origination, and value creation in partnership with management to build franchises of lasting value. Over the past 35+ years, Oak Hill and its predecessors have raised over $20 billion of initial capital commitments & co-investments and invested in approximately 100 companies representing an aggregate enterprise value at acquisition of over $60 billion. For more information, please visit www.oakhill.com.

About Stephens Capital Partners

Stephens Capital Partners LLC (“SCP”) is the principal investing arm of the Warren A. Stephens family and Stephens Inc. SCP identifies opportunities to work with industry-leading management teams with a long-term perspective. SCP provides public and private companies with capital for purposes of growth, recapitalization, and leveraged buyouts. For more information, see www.stephenscapitalpartners.com. 

Stephens Inc. is a full-service investment banking firm headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas serving a broad client base of corporations, state and local governments, financial institutions, institutional and individual investors throughout the United States and overseas. The firm is a member of the New York Stock Exchange and SIPC. For more information, see www.stephens.com.

About The Pritzker Organization

The Pritzker Organization is focused on partnering with exceptional leaders to create value across a wide range of industries. For more than 60 years, TPO has overseen and guided the development of dozens of portfolio companies across a wide variety of industries, including telecom, manufacturing, logistics, life sciences, hospitality, healthcare, and services. Additional information can be found at https://pritzkerorg.com/.

SOURCE Lit Communities – LW