Funding toward Statera is helping to solve the urgent problem of physician compensation

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz., Feb. 14, 2023 — DWP Capital, a venture capital firm that invests in early-stage software companies, today announces its recent investment into Statera. Leading the round, and followed by In Revenue Capital, the firm was eager to fund the vertical-specific startup that solves the real and pressing problem of physician compensation and attrition. DWP Capital is focused on investing in vertical Software-as-a-Service companies that fix niche problems and provide massive value, and in founders who have deep industry expertise and a clear vision for the future.

“We were drawn to Statera for numerous reasons, especially the fact that physician compensation and attrition are major problems for which the market has been seeking a solution,” says David Paul, managing director at DWP Capital. “So the fact that there’s market pull and demonstrable ROI here was greatly compelling. Even more, we were incredibly impressed by founder Amy Jackson. She has a history of working within hospital systems and building products, and we align with her philosophically, particularly in our commitment to being capital-efficient and driven toward growth.”

Statera provides timely, actionable compensation and care insights to physicians, executive leaders and hospital systems. It eliminates the emotional and financial cost of physician burnout, while increasing retention. Statera is a unique solution, the most lightweight, easy to use and quickest to value product in the market. It was designed based on what customers want, built to stand alone while being interdependent with other systems as necessary. The roadmap for the software is robust, with forecasting and analytics capabilities on the horizon.

“Physician compensation management is an unnecessarily complex, fragile, and expensive process. We are determined to simplify physician compensation management, and drastically reduce the associated costs to provider organizations,” said Amy Jackson, CEO and co-founder at Statera. “Our team’s industry and technical expertise is unparalleled. David and DWP Capital bring us resources and networks that will rapidly accelerate our ability to reach the market in 2023.”

In Revenue Capital joined the funding round, bringing rich value to the investment as the first operator-immersive capital firm focused on early-growth investing. In addition to financing, the company will continue to build Statera’s sales engine and optimize for exponential growth, while keeping quality at its peak.

To learn more about DWP Capital’s portfolio, please visit https://dwpcapital.com/portfolio/.

About DWP Capital

DWP Capital is a Venture Capital Firm that invests in early stage software companies, located in Scottsdale, Arizona. The firm focuses primarily on B2B companies in the regions of Arizona, Southern California and Colorado. Its major investments are with companies that have proven management teams, domain experience, consumer acceptance and capital efficient business models. For more information, please visit https://dwpcapital.com/.

SOURCE DWP Capital

Sandbox Banking seamlessly connects core banking, loan origination and CRM systems to fintechs via its Glyue API builder.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., Feb. 14, 2023 — Sandbox Banking, the fintech building a low-code integration platform for banking, announces its completion of a strategic investment led by Horizon Ventures, bringing the company’s total financing to $6M. Participating investors include Forum Ventures, SixThirty, Tuesday Capital. Using the company’s Glyue™ platform, banks and credit unions can accelerate digital transformation using pre-built API adapters and solution templates to securely connect existing systems with fintech partners. Sandbox Banking’s game-changing API builder platform already empowers teams at over 70 financial institutions across the US & Canada, including Bank Newport, Silicon Valley Bank, United Bank, Choice Financial, and Service Credit Union.

Sales teams at fintech partners like nCino, FIS and Five9 praise the Glyue platform’s pre-existing adapter catalogs responsible for delivering integration and support capabilities across critical customer systems. Fintech partners also love how Glyue’s solution template catalog reduces implementation timelines with its self-service capability for bank staff. With deeper integrations into some of the largest global fintech companies on the 2023 roadmap, Sandbox Banking will use this capital to accelerate hiring for new product development and solution delivery capacity.

“The infrastructure and product framework needed to integrate core banking and fintech systems has historically been plagued with complaints of incompatible systems that generate lengthy integration timelines, lack of customization beyond cookie-cutter integrations, and lack of agile support for future changes based on user behavior. Glyue makes this process seamless and more efficient than ever, and will continue to power the next generation of integrated digital banking systems that are unlocking fintech for society,” said Ravi Balasubramanian, CEO of Sandbox Banking. “Horizon Ventures and Tuesday are two industry leaders in finding platform solutions that transform industries and we’re thrilled to have them on board as both investors and strategic advisors.”

“With the launch of this integration using Glyue, a tremendous amount of work is being taken off of the team, which is a huge win for gaining buy-in and engagement related to our overall transformation efforts,” said John Sullivan, CIO of Bank Newport. “Sandbox allows our internal tech teams at Bank Newport to focus on serving our customer’s needs knowing they have a technology partner in Sandbox Banking.”

“Sandbox is the best banking infrastructure startup I’ve seen in years. What Stripe did for accessibility, Sandbox is poised to do with fintech integrations. They are the ‘Glyue – pun intended’ required to connect the banking sector to the fintech innovations required to compete over the next decade,” said Patrick Gallagher, Co-founder and Managing Partner at Tuesday Capital.

88% of bank and credit union CIOs complain that integration challenges slow down their digital transformation, since until now there hasn’t been a purpose-built API platform to enhance the collaboration between core banking systems and the cloud-based applications that their business partners want to adopt. Glyue can reduce development times of common integrations by 80% and accelerate most digital banking integration projects. With an API builder platform now integrated into their existing systems, banks and credit unions can focus on driving revenue growth via offering BaaS capabilities or API Banking to indirect lending partners, or drive balance-sheet efficiency with inter-institutional solutions.

About Sandbox Banking

Sandbox Banking is a fintech building a low-code integration platform called Glyue to help banks and credit unions connect fintech products into their existing systems. Banks and credit unions grow revenue and increase operational efficiency by securely integrating fintech products with their existing infrastructure via Glyue. The company’s fintech partners close financial institution sales faster and can offer seamless integrated experiences across banking customer systems. Sandbox Banking’s investors include Horizon Ventures. Tuesday Capital, Forum Ventures, SixThirty & YCombinator.

To learn more about Glyue, visit https://sandboxbanking.com.

Contact Information
Rick Medeiros
[email protected]
510-556-8517

SOURCE Sandbox Banking

Aimed at bringing mobile cloud technology to game developers and gamers, the investment is an affirmation of the two companies vision for mobile cloud

CAMPBELL, Calif., Feb. 14, 2023 — now.gg, Inc. announced that it has received an undisclosed amount of investment from NTT DoCoMo Ventures for their cloud-based mobile gaming distribution platform. The investment is aimed at bringing next-generation mobile cloud technology to game developers and gamers.

Launched in June 2021, now.gg is a mobile cloud gaming platform that makes it possible to convert Android based mobile games to cloud games by simply converting APK files to cloud versions, making them accessible on any browser. Cloud converted mobile games can then be accessed on any devices or any browser, free of cost, through unique game links. Gamers can play or share games without any need to install the Android game.

In little over a year, the distribution platform has amassed over 42 million users, with half the gamers playing for over 30mins per day, surpassing many cloud gaming benchmarks. Gamers from multiple devices like PC, Android, Mac and even console platforms are accessing now.gg distributed cloud games through built-in browsers.

now.gg’s proprietary nowCloudOS cloud rendering technology enables game developers to publish their games to the cloud with minimal effort. It also enables reach for users who were previously unable to access games due to device limitations.

Much of today’s entertainment, including games and other content, is provided in the form of apps. now.gg’s mission is to provide users with a different app experience by providing mobile cloud technology. Even if the content of the app is further enhanced and the amount of data becomes enormous, it will be possible to enjoy it comfortably with a browser anytime, anywhere with now.gg’s solution.

Since 2022, NTT DoCoMo has been providing a multi-device metaverse service that can be easily enjoyed on a browser. This investment was made in anticipation of synergies with the new user experience that is being worked on. Going forward, now.gg and NTT Group and DOCOMO will collaborate further to promote initiatives aimed at creating new value.

Logo: https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/2002160/now_gg_logo.jpg

SOURCE now.gg

Cloud-based platform empowers creatives to streamline post production workflows, collaborate in real-time, and unlock their creative potential

BOULDER, Colo., Feb. 14, 2023 — Suite Studios, a cloud-based platform that empowers creative teams to take control of their post-production workflows, today announced the close of their $3.5 million seed round led by Bonfire Ventures, with participation from Range Ventures and other angel investors. Suite Studios’ easy-to-use cloud-based platform replaces on-premise hardware so creatives and creative teams can focus less on managing infrastructure and more on what matters most – making great content. Since Suite Studios was first made available in February 2022, the company has experienced 60 percent revenue growth month over month leading up to the raise.

“The traditional post production process is incredibly time-consuming and costly for creatives and teams,” said Craig Hering, CEO, and co-founder of Suite Studios. “As a former creative director, I’ve experienced the pains of shipping external hard drives, managing cumbersome and expensive on-prem hardware and servers, and traveling to the office for last-minute edits firsthand. I knew I had a solution that could help creatives do better work without all the headaches. We created Suite Studios to help creatives streamline their production workflows and get the most out of the design tools they know and love.”

Despite the fact that the creative industry is highly collaborative and computer and hardware intensive, it is one of the last industries to transition to the cloud because it runs on massive file sizes. This means that, traditionally, each post production team member needs a local copy of files to work on projects, resulting in costly hardware and data storage and tedious file transfer practices, such as shipping hard drives across state lines to complete projects. This problem compounds quickly and often means that only those who can invest large amounts of capital into hardware win. To make matters worse, demand for UHD video and computer-generated graphics is only increasing, pouring fuel on the roaring “post production workflow” fire.

Suite Studios’ robust cloud-based platform, powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS), is the easiest way for creative teams to transition to a cloud-based workflow in less than a day, with some studios transitioning from 100 percent on-prem to 100 percent cloud-based in just three months. With features like virtual workstations, the ability to share projects in ‘view-only’ or ‘edit’ in real-time with teams and clients, frame-accurate A/V sync, automatic shutdown, and high color accuracy (4:4:4 color), Suite Studios is specifically built with creative teams in mind.

“We look to back companies with innovative solutions to solve big customer pain points, and Suite Studios’ growth in just a matter of months speaks for itself,” said Brett Queener, managing director at Bonfire Ventures. “For far too long, post production agencies’ growth has been limited by their ability to fund large up-front investments in computing power and ensure they have corresponding customer demand to offset them. With Suite, the answer is, indeed, no more. Every post production agency can now focus on and compete for any work, anywhere and get back to focus all their time on being amazing creators.”

Suite Studios provides the following benefits for heads of post production studios:

• Removes the headaches of managing on-premise hardware, servers, and other infrastructure, so they can focus on content management and finding talent.
• Results in a better understanding of how much projects cost from an equipment and storage perspective, so they can better project costs and align with business objectives.
• Eliminates the need for a team to work on-site, opening up the opportunity for a distributed workforce so studios can recruit the best and brightest talent.

Suite Studios provides the following benefits for creative teams:

• Increases power of real-time collaboration by allowing creatives to easily join sessions with their team on design tools they have already invested in.
• Improves overall work quality by reducing downtime and increasing productivity.
• Provides a collaborative day-to-day experience similar to a pre-pandemic work environment, without the need for creatives to be physically tied to their desktop.
• Allows creatives to compete based on their actual work product versus what kinds of equipment they are able to afford.

“Suite Studios has transformed the way our teams manage their workflows so we can do our best work,” said Dan Tundis, EP, Director of Post-Production at Hometeam, which is using Suite Studios to run its post-production process. “By helping us easily move to the cloud and taking off the weight of managing tech infrastructure, Suite Studios has helped us reduce project turnaround time and get more out of our existing tools, putting us in a better position to hit our business goals.”

The new funding will primarily go toward serving Suite Studio’s growing list of customers and recruiting top talent, particularly to help develop innovative products to satisfy customers’ ongoing needs for streamlined cloud workflows. To learn more, visit: www.suitestudios.io.

About Suite Studios

Suite Studios equips post production teams with a blazing fast cloud studio that scales to meet the demands of any project. Suite Studios aims to help creative agencies of all sizes reach their potential by allowing them to focus on what they do best: create content. Its technology levels the playing field to lead a movement where creative agencies compete on the strength of their creative work, rather than their resources. Suite Studios is backed by Bonfire Ventures. To learn more, visit www.suitestudios.io/.

SOURCE Suite Studios

The funding round led by Lobby Capital fast-tracks the growth of the next generation PAM helping enterprises improve and streamline their Identity and Access Operations

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Feb. 14, 2023 — Procyon, the industry’s first Privilege Access Management platform built for multi-cloud environments, today announced a $6.5 million equity financing to help organizations harness the growing identity and access management sprawl in cloud environments. The new investment was led by Lobby Capital with participation from GTM Capital and First Rays Venture Partners. This funding comes as Procyon, which already counts Fortune 100 companies among its early adopters, releases the industry’s first privilege access management solution built from the ground up for cloud native environments.

The adoption of cloud-based infrastructure has created a gold rush for cyber criminals to steal credentials, which has compounded in complexity with the use of modern cloud systems like AWS, Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and Azure. According to a recent study, there are 30,000 unique permissions across the three major public clouds, with 17 new permissions being added every day. With the increase of required credentials for developers, the attack surface in enterprises is rising exponentially.

To meet this challenge, Procyon is redefining the conventional approach to privilege access management for developers and DevOps teams with a new model that meets their need for quick access to systems and applications while working across distributed teams to manage thousands of cloud services.

The Procyon Multi-Cloud Privilege Access Management platform offers

• Self-Service Access – With a self-service portal that can be customized to incorporate enterprise security processes, the Procyon platform allows DevOps and Identity Access Management (IAM) Operations teams to request on-demand access to resources
• Zero Standing & Just in time Privileges (ZSP & JIT) – By enforcing zero standing privileges (ZSP) along with Just in time (JIT) access, the Procyon platform also eliminates security exposures from over privileged access to resources and personnel
• Strong Device Identity – Using a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip on the modern devices, Procyon enables passwordless sign-in to all resources
• Compliance & Governance – The Procyon architecture offers the highest standard of compliance with support for major standards like PCI/SOC2 and audit logging and analytics allowing enterprises with the necessary visibility into who has access to what and when.

“Conventional PAM solutions are currently caught between a proverbial rock and hard place,” said Sukhesh Halemane, CEO and Co-Founder, Procyon. “Cloud computing has exponentially increased the complexity of IT resources requiring privileged management. At the same time, escalating security concerns are forcing many modern enterprises to incorporate the best practices. Procyon’s frictionless experience allows DevOps teams to operate both efficiently and securely.” 

Customers Underscore the Value of a Cloud-Based PAM Solution
“With the growth in public cloud computing-based systems like AWS, Google Cloud Platform and Azure, enterprises are looking for ways to keep their guard up against the constant, evolving threats that arise,” said Lucas Moody, former Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer, Palo Alto Networks. “Procyon’s cloud-based PAM solution provides a robust way to manage privileges in today’s modern enterprise that demands greater control and governance to reduce business risk, complexity, and costs.”

Industry Experts Highlight the Critical Need for A Next Generation PAM
“Privileged accounts used to create, configure and administer IT resources are the ‘crown jewels’ of every company’s IT estate.  Conventional solutions for Privileged Access Management (PAM) have been undermined by the explosion of cloud-based services and the corresponding democratization of resource management roles across a company’s  entire workforce,” said Mark Settle, former CIO Okta Inc. “Procyon provides a practical, low friction solution for shielding cloud resources from intrusion or misuse by malicious actors by leveraging state-of-the-art biometric technology and microprocessor architectures to verify employee identity throughout a privileged work session.”

Learn more about Procyon’s solutions at https://www.procyon.ai/.

About Procyon   
Procyon’s Privilege Access Management solution, built from the ground up for multi-cloud and API based infrastructure, makes it easy for enterprises to manage privileges and access to critical resources. The Procyon solution leverages next generation networking, passwordless, and self-service capabilities to provide a seamless and secure solution. The company is headquartered in Santa Clara, California. For more information, visit https://www.procyon.ai or connect with us at email address and LinkedIn.

For more information, contact: [email protected]

SOURCE Procyon.ai

CINCINNATI, Feb. 14, 2023 — Brixey & Meyer Capital (“BMC”) announced today a growth capital investment in MasVida Healthcare Solutions (“MasVida”). Headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, MasVida provides respiratory, oxygen, wound therapy and other critical medical equipment along with hygiene products to post-acute care facilities across Texas. Josh Robertson will continue as the CEO of MasVida and both Josh and George Robertson will remain as owners in the business.

MasVida makes healthcare equipment rental simple and facility hygiene better by lowering the costs and raising the quality of care for its customers. MasVida’s comprehensive solution drives improved outcomes with better products with same day guaranteed delivery, all at a manageable monthly payment.

“We are excited to partner with BMC as they share the entrepreneurial spirit that George and I have operated the business with over the years,” said Josh Robertson, CEO of MasVida. “BMC’s partnership is merely a continuation of our mission of providing best-in-class equipment and hygiene products when our customers need them the most.”

“Partnering with MasVida allows us to help support and fuel the growth of the business in Texas and strategically across the United States,” David Brixey, CEO of Brixey & Meyer Capital said, “the MasVida management team combined with this platform offers a diversified healthcare solution we are extremely excited to be a part of.”

About Brixey & Meyer Capital:

Brixey & Meyer Capital is a lower middle market private investment firm located in Cincinnati, Ohio. Since its founding, BMC has closed twelve investments and raised over $124 million in committed capital to invest in lower middle-market companies. Brixey & Meyer Capital currently manages seven different platforms across a variety of industries. Follow Brixey & Meyer Capital on LinkedIn here.

About MasVida Health Solutions

MasVida Health is a full-service provider of durable medical equipment rental solutions coupled with its comprehensive cleaning, surface disinfection, and hand hygiene product offering. A unique floor-to-ceiling, science-based approach provides safer and healthier environments, reduces costs, and improves quality of life for patients and facility operators alike. MasVida is HQAA accredited and has delivered quality equipment and product to its customers for over 25 years.

MasVida provides the industry’s only OneSource integrated medical equipment rental and facility hygiene solution to post-acute care facilities. OneSource is a customizable, bundled service approach for basic and advanced DME, hand hygiene, cleaning, surface disinfection, odor elimination, and infection prevention programs that improve outcomes for less.

Learn more by visiting MasVida Healthcare Solutions.

Contact: Patrick Odell, patrick.odell@bmcgrowth.com

SOURCE Brixey & Meyer Capital

PASADENA, Calif., Feb. 14, 2023 — Alexandria Venture Investments, the strategic venture capital platform of Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. (NYSE: ARE), the first, preeminent, longest-tenured and pioneering owner, operator and developer of collaborative life science, agtech and technology campuses in AAA innovation cluster locations with approximately 1,000 tenants and an asset base in North America of over 74 million SF, today announced that it was ranked by AgFunder as one of the top five most active U.S.-based investors in agrifoodtech for the third consecutive year. This noteworthy recognition, which is based on the number of companies in which Alexandria invested in 2022, highlights the company’s continued leadership within the agrifoodtech industry and its deep commitment to supporting cutting-edge companies that are accelerating and scaling transformative technological innovations to ensure a more nutritious, accessible, resilient and economically viable global food supply as well as to mitigate the impacts of climate change — endeavors that are vital to effecting lasting change that will improve nutrition to advance human health. Alexandria’s highly focused agrifoodtech investing continues to provide keen insights into sector-wide trends, deepen its relationships with influential ecosystem stakeholders and further enhance its REIT industry-leading client base of high-quality and diverse tenants. For more than two decades, Alexandria has developed and operated state-of-the-art R&D and greenhouse infrastructure and actively invested in impactful agrifoodtech companies that are advancing novel approaches that have immense potential to address pressing societal issues around sustainability, agriculture, food and nutrition.

“Macro challenges, such as a changing climate, aggressive geopolitics and decades of unsustainable farming practices, continue to adversely impact our food supply and therefore our health, creating a massive opportunity for innovative agrifoodtech solutions, such as the development of climate-resilient crops and more sustainable protein sources,” said Blake Stevens, PhD, vice president of science and technology at Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. and Alexandria Venture Investments. “Like never before, consumers are demanding transparency and action to combat these global concerns. Alexandria is proud to lead the way in identifying and supporting new technologies, especially those at the intersection of climate, agriculture and food, that will vastly improve the way we live, what we eat and how we work and, in turn, help fulfill our overall mission to advance human health.”

Venture capital investment in the agrifoodtech sector skyrocketed with more than $130 billion invested over the five-year period from 2017 to 2021, compared with only $30 billion over the previous five years. Additionally, preliminary data for 2022 is tracking to be the second-highest funding year on record as investors continue to recognize the broad opportunities for disruption in this mission-critical industry. In the face of having to meet the nutritional needs of the world’s growing population and address pressing sustainability and climate issues, developing and adopting new strategies and technologies is imperative to help solve these complex and far-reaching challenges. Alexandria Venture Investments’ agrifoodtech investments are focused on driving innovation across a range of emerging technologies, including data-driven artificial intelligence and machine learning, synthetic biology, gene editing, robotics and sustainable protein production, which are poised to dramatically redefine traditional agricultural practices while creating a more secure, healthier and productive global food system to benefit society for the long term.

About Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. 
Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc. (NYSE: ARE), an S&P 500^® company, is a best-in-class, mission-driven life science REIT making a positive and lasting impact on the world. As the pioneer of the life science real estate niche since its founding in 1994, Alexandria is the preeminent and longest-tenured owner, operator and developer of collaborative life science, agtech and technology campuses in AAA innovation cluster locations, including Greater Boston, the San Francisco Bay Area, New York City, San Diego, Seattle, Maryland and Research Triangle. The trusted partner to approximately 1,000 tenants, Alexandria has a total market capitalization of $35.0 billion and an asset base in North America of 74.6 million SF as of December 31, 2022, which includes 41.8 million RSF of operating properties and 5.6 million RSF of Class A properties undergoing construction, 9.9 million RSF of near-term and intermediate-term development and redevelopment projects and 17.3 million SF of future development projects. Alexandria has a longstanding and proven track record of developing Class A properties clustered in life science, agtech and technology campuses that provide our innovative tenants with highly dynamic and collaborative environments that enhance their ability to successfully recruit and retain world-class talent and inspire productivity, efficiency, creativity and success. Alexandria also provides strategic capital to transformative life science, agrifoodtech, climate innovation and technology companies through our venture capital platform. We believe our unique business model and diligent underwriting ensure a high-quality and diverse tenant base that results in higher occupancy levels, longer lease terms, higher rental income, higher returns and greater long-term asset value. For additional information on Alexandria, please visit www.are.com. 

Forward-Looking Statements 
This press release includes “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. Such forward-looking statements include, without limitation, statements regarding the likelihood of continued investment activity by the Alexandria Venture Investments platform and Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc., the potential impacts of such investments on Alexandria’s business and the companies in which Alexandria invests, the current and future development and effectiveness of agrifoodtech and the impact of such agrifoodtech on climate change and other societal issues, such as sustainability, agriculture, food and nutrition. These forward-looking statements are based on Alexandria’s present intent, beliefs or expectations, but forward-looking statements are not guaranteed to occur and may not occur. Actual results may differ materially from those contained in or implied by Alexandria’s forward-looking statements as a result of a variety of factors, including, without limitation, the risks and uncertainties detailed in its filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. All forward-looking statements are made as of the date of this press release, and Alexandria assumes no obligation to update this information. For more discussion relating to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated in Alexandria’s forward-looking statements, and risks and uncertainties to Alexandria’s business in general, please refer to Alexandria’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent annual report on Form 10-K and any subsequently filed quarterly reports on Form 10-Q. 

CONTACT: Sara Kabakoff, Vice President – Strategic Communications, (626) 788-5578, [email protected]

SOURCE Alexandria Real Estate Equities, Inc.

Predictive media monitoring firm announces funding from AshGrove Capital to help communications and media professionals predict stories and topics that will matter.

DUBLIN and NEW YORK, Feb. 14, 2023 — NewsWhip, the predictive media monitoring platform, today announced that it has secured $13 million in funding from London-based AshGrove Capital.

NewsWhip gives communications professionals and journalists clarity on the chaos of digital and social media. Its technology tracks which stories and narratives are gaining momentum in real time – and predicts which ones will matter in the hours ahead. Rather than artificial intelligence, NewsWhip’s platform enables “extended intelligence” – allowing communications and media professionals to make better decisions and be more efficient with their time.

“We’re excited to bring AshGrove Capital on board as investors,” says NewsWhip CEO Paul Quigley. “Their team recognizes the transformation underway in the communication profession, and the unique position NewsWhip has in enabling that transformation. We share a vision where NewsWhip is the real-time eyes and ears of every sophisticated comms department in the world.”

Ilkka Rantanen, Co-Founder and Partner at AshGrove Capital, said: “The challenges NewsWhip helps solve for their customers are becoming more topical for global organizations and critical for real-time responsiveness. Our investment perfectly aligns with the company’s technology-led approach to offer a unique and innovative solution in a growing market, and we look forward to supporting the Company to further enable communication professionals to be more focused, prepared and reactive to global news events.”

The funding will allow NewsWhip to accelerate its mission to identify and predict the news, narratives, and ideas that shape the world each day for users including Google, Meta, The New York Times, Samsung, and the BBC.

NewsWhip anticipates a 50 percent increase in headcount from 2022 to 2024. NewsWhip is becoming a must-have service in the fast-changing $5.5bn PR and media technology market.

NewsWhip was advised on the transaction by Pegasus Capital, a financial advisory firm based in Dublin, Ireland.

About AshGrove Capital
AshGrove Capital is an independently owned London based specialty lending fund with a sector-led approach focusing on software and services underpinned by the teams’ deep sectoral experience. AshGrove Capital provides tailored credit solutions for a range of transactions from organic and inorganic growth financing to buyouts, supporting a variety of shareholders including private equity, growth equity, VCs and founder-entrepreneurs.

About NewsWhip
NewsWhip (www.newswhip.com) is the only real-time media monitoring platform that predicts the stories and topics that will matter in the hours ahead, giving communications professionals the clarity they need for quick and confident decisions. The NewsWhip platform helps clients to predict the news, unpack crises and issues, and better understand which stories are engaging audiences on a global and local scale. NewsWhip’s clients come from 80 countries around the world, and include PepsiCo, Google, Tinder, ConAgra Samsung, McDonald’s, Walmart, ABInBev, the Associated Press, Condé Nast and the Washington Post, along with NGOs such as Amnesty International, Médecins Sans Frontières and the World Health Organization.

About Pegasus Capital
Pegasus Capital, a financial advisory firm based in Dublin, Ireland is an active adviser to Irish technology companies with other recent notable transactions including; the $64m sale of StitcherAds to Kargo Global Inc., the €45m sale of Adaptive Mobile Security to Enea AB, and the $56m investment in LearnUpon by Summit Partners.

SOURCE NewsWhip

Funds will be used to develop the Monad Labs ecosystem

CHICAGO, Feb. 14, 2023 — Monad Labs, the team supporting the high-performance Monad blockchain, today announced the closing of a $19 million seed funding round led by Dragonfly Capital. The round saw additional participation from 70 investors, including Placeholder Capital, Lemniscap, Shima Capital, Finality Capital, as well as notable angel investors in the space such as Naval Ravikant, Cobie, and Hasu – amongst others.

Founded in 2022, Monad Labs is an early-stage, venture-backed tech startup, whose team brings with them over seven years of experience in building low-latency, high-frequency-trading systems at Jump Trading. Currently, the growth of decentralized finance (DeFi) on Ethereum-compatible platforms is hampered by the inefficiency of existing Layer1 protocols, which offer limited throughput at a high cost. These factors limit the functionality of decentralized applications (Dapps) and make it difficult for them to scale for mass adoption. Monad Labs addresses all these issues through its Monad blockchain, an Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM)-compatible Layer1 smart contract platform designed to provide many multiples of the throughput offered by Ethereum.

“Monad Labs is building the smart contract platform with the performance needed to truly unlock the transformative power of decentralized computation,” said Keone Hon, Co-Founder & CEO of Monad Labs. “The Monad blockchain will set the industry standards for the speed, transparency, security and scalability that all Layer1 protocols should have, and its true impact will be felt across both the Web2 and Web3 ecosystems. This successful seed round demonstrates the need for Monad in the marketplace and the shared commitment from all to advance the industry. We are excited to work alongside our investors to bring Monad to market, build out its capabilities and show the world exactly what blockchains can do.”

Through this investment, Monad Labs will be able to further its commitment to building the next level of Layer1 smart contract platforms with Monad. The Monad blockchain operates on a Proof of Stake consensus protocol and, by design, is set to process a total of 10,000 transactions per second. Monad achieves this by making several key improvements to the EVM standard including parallel and asynchronous execution of transactions.

James Hunsaker, Co-Founder & CTO of Monad Labs, added, “The capabilities of any Dapp are in part determined by the power of the blockchain on which it is built. The high cost of computation on existing blockchains significantly limits what can be built on-chain, and forces developers to choose between security and computation efficiency, ultimately leading to security issues. At Monad Labs we are creating a blockchain that addresses these issues, creating the potential for rapid innovation in the decentralized landscape.”

Monad offers a high-performance environment that empowers developers to build the next level of highly complex and scalable Dapps. Monad is compatible with all other EVM-based smart contracts and will be going live on a testnet in the coming months with the mainnet launch occurring later this year.

Investor Quotes:

Haseeb Qureshi, Managing Partner at Dragonfly Capital, commented on the raise: “We’re excited to lead Monad’s seed round. Monad is a truly unique and exciting project that will have the level of throughput needed for wide-scale adoption of decentralized finance. Keone and James have the subject matter expertise and technical skills needed to deliver on a high-throughput Layer1 blockchain that will set new standards for how blockchains will operate moving forward.”

Chris Burniske, Partner at Placeholder Capital, commented on the raise: “With a founding team that originated from Jump, Monad Labs understands the need for speed. The team is in the midst of parallelizing the EVM, creating a blockchain network and EVM-environment that rivals the performance of traditional tech & finance. In conversations with their leadership, it’s also clear Monad is working to anticipate developer tooling and harness technological convergences that will be needed when crypto is no longer niche, but at scale within society. Though there are already a few established leaders in Layer1 smart contract protocols, Monad has a differentiated, innovative, and ethical approach that will be worth keeping an eye on.”

About Monad Labs
Monad Labs is an early-stage, venture-backed tech startup founded in 2022. The co-founders of Monad Labs have roots in Jump Trading, where they worked together for seven years building low-latency high-frequency-trading (HFT) systems, and later contributing to R&D at Jump Crypto in 2021. This was the genesis of Monad — synthesizing learnings from HFT, as well as some new ideas, to build the most performant and robust smart-contract blockchain possible. Monad applies expertise in low-latency programming, compiler optimization, systems engineering, cryptography, and graph theory to substantially advance the performance and scalability of decentralized computation.

Media Contact
M Group Strategic Communications (on behalf of Monad Labs)
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SOURCE Monad Labs