🤑 Boston Tech Deals: 16 Boston Companies To Have Raised a Collective $104M
🤑 Boston Tech Deals: 16 Boston Companies To Have Raised a Collective $104M
A company making quantum computing a reality for enterprise, a robot trash can that takes out your trash, and a company that eliminates industrial waste via microbes are among this weeks' companies 🤩
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If you’re new here, I’m Abigail! I’m a mechanical-engineer-turned-investor at Hyperplane, a venture capital firm in Boston that has been investing in seed-stage machine learning companies since 2015. Every two weeks, this newsletter serves to list Boston’s latest financings and highlight ecosystem players and happenings.
If you were forwarded this email, join the community of thousands of Boston’s best tech and finance folks reading alongside you!
‼️ A quick PSA before jumping in:
🌲 🌊 ⚠️ While posted up on the porch in Vermont last week, having planned for nothing but a humid week OOO on the lake, the state got hit with massive storms. Vermont’s infrastructure was grossly unprepared, as the state historically has been set up to anticipate damage from the heavy winter snow, not summer rain storms. Flood damage was rampant across the midsection of the state, gravel from car driveways turned to quicksand taking cars with it, cement roads completely caved in, and dirt roads completely washed away. Zooming in: my dad owns a hydropowered mill in the town of Calais and as 8 inches of rain was added to the mill pond, the water breached the dam, sending the entire town into a panic about the potential of a wipe-out. But alas, the town came together, helping to put down tarps and sandbags to prevent any land washing and so, for now, the water is contained. Even though the structural integrity of the dam is still intact, damage is still likely to amount to tens of thousands of dollars, and my parents’ homeowners insurance doesn’t cover floods. Zooming out: As much as this sucks for parents, my dad’s case is not unique. Many, many people are much worse off— homeowners, entrepreneurs, and farmers whose annual income depends on these assets. Since the storms, FEMA has made funding available for the state after this was officially declared a natural disaster, but the timeline to recovery for farmers and small business owners in rural Vermont will be long, and damage is largely unquantifiable for folks who relied on storm-destroyed assets as a source of income.
I’d encourage anyone reading this issue this morning to consider donating to any of the organizations that are actively contributing to disaster relief in the state of Vermont.
Back to our regularly scheduled programming. Welcome back!
Happy Tuesday! I do hope everyone was able to find the exact model of fancy microwave or drone camera during Amazon’s Prime Day, since it looks like many other folks did. Shoppers this year spent $12.7B on 375+ million items over the 2-day event. Translation: prepare for a pervasive presence of Amazon delivery trucks this week.
Anyways, tons of fun stuff in Boston recently! The twelve temporary pickleball courts at Fenway Park last week were an absolute hit, and don’t worry, *Harpoon Brewery in the Seaport has entered the chat* with 4 pickleball courts open from 12-9PM. What’s more, Shakespeare on the Common will start their open-air performance of five-act play Macbeth on Wednesday at 8PM, and Kamala Harris will be in town on the 29th to deliver her keynote speech at the NAACP's national convention. Things to do, people to seeeee!
Boston placed 15th on CNBC’s Top States for Business 2023, a list scoring states on 86 metrics across 10 categories, weighted based on how frequently states use them in marketing materials. Boston saw its best numbers across access to capital, lifestyle and inclusion, education, and tech and innovation metrics. On the flip side, we notched one the lowest numbers in cost of doing business, only above Hawaii, and placed 47th (out of, yes, 50) in cost of living. In other Boston news, FYI: the MBTA Green Line's B line will shut down between BC and Kenmore from the 17th to the 28th of July.
This week, since I was out, there are no local features, but we do have 16 companies that raised just under $104M over the last two weeks, and another 2 that grossed $300K in non-dilutive funding from Google for Startups’ program announced last week. Among the companies to have been funded, we’re heavy on consumer companies, although all of them are pretty different. As for the largest fundings, they were both Climate Tech companies, which I’d say is pretty relevant for this week (on that note- make sure you’re checking the air quality score before exercising outside this week). Enjoy!
And so, with that, let’s get into it.
Boston Financings: 7/5 - 7/18
Financings are listed from smallest to largest. Biotech financings over $80M+ are usually not covered.
*Revisions: I covered Adaptilens raising a $1.6M seed round last week. Adaptilens did raise a $1.6M priced seed round in Oct 2020, but the Form D in question covered in the last issue was actually for a $1.6M bridge (alternatively, a “seed extension”) round that closed in June 2023.
Modality | $40K | SMB Tech
A SaaS-powered marketplace supporting diverse entrepreneurs launch and grow private wellness practices, Modality, has raised $40K from 3 investors towards a total offering amount filed for $300K. Founded by Laura Vitale, Modality plans to start with the LGBTQ+ community, providing them with marketing support and educational trainings for business expansion.
Salus | $150K debt | (Social) Enterprise SaaS
Salus, a provider of a SaaS-based case management for social enterprises to better track, act, and report on their mission-driven work, has raised $150K in debt from 4 investors towards a total offering amount filed for $750K. Cofounded by serial entreprenuers, J. Bradford (Brad) Kain and Jean Pierre LeJacq, after cofounding Quoin together in 1994, Salus’ platform offers case management features, configurable workflow, flexible reporting, and built-in data protections.
Leading Indicator Systems | $220K | HR Tech
Provider of a purpose-built survey platform for human capital solutions, Leading Indicator Systems, has raised $220K from 4 investors in the form of convertible debt. Built in a series of integrated modules in combination with their emotional survey-platform rooted in neuroscience principles, AgileBrain, Leading Indicator Systems’ platform is highly customizable and aims to understand and address a workforce’s emotional wellbeing. More on the tech from a feature in 2022 here.
Rezzi | $1M | Consumer
Developer of IoT connected devices aimed at making waste collection more transparent, Rezzi, has raised $1M from 24 total investors. Rezzi creates IoT-based robotic devices that offer a motorized trash can attachment and a corresponding mobile app for users to set the specific day and time they need their trash to be at the curb for pickup. By collecting data on waste generation, Rezzi enables municipals to track and reduce their waste with more refined data. Co-founder Andrew Murray has more on LinkedIn.
Attn:Grace | $2M | Consumer
Developer of female incontinence products, Attn:Grace, has raised a $2M Seed extension round led by For Later with participation from Flybridge, Kapor Capital, Ingeborg Investments, and Portfolia. Attn:Grace makes natural, skin-safe solutions for female bladder leakage, including undergarments and pads, and is a Certified B Corp, which they believe drives home their vision of social and environmental performance. The company has raised ~$5M to date, according to Crunchbase.
Crop One | $2.5M debt | AgTech
Pesticide-free vertical farming company using ~95% less water and a fraction of the land required for traditional field-based growing, Crop One, has raised $2.3M in the form of debt. Crop One boasts a substantially longer shelf life for their produce as a result of proprietary processes inclusive of modular growth rooms, water purification and distribution systems, nutrient recipes, and data collection. In 2022, Crop One and Emirates airline announced Emirates Crop One, a $40M joint venture to grow three US tons (6,000 lbs) of leafy greens annually for the airline’s catering service.
Pet’s Table | $2.5M | Consumer
Latin American direct-to-consumer subscription pet food brand, Pet’s Table, has raised $2.5M from 4 total investors. Pet's Table products are made with real human grade ingredients, as the company prides itself on not adding any processed or artificial ingredients. They last raised a $2.1M Seed round led by Left Lane Capital in August of 2022 after two years of bootstrapping the company.
Vistapath Biosystems | $4.4M | Healthcare
Developer of Sentinel AI, an AI platform automating anatomical pathology processes in the lab, Vistapath has raised $4.4M from 5 investors towards a total offering amount filed for $5.6M. Vistapath’s tissue grossing platform automates the process of inspecting, inking, and measuring tissues. Vistapath last raised a $4M Seed round from Moxxie Ventures and First Star Ventures.
Zapata Computing | $4.9M | AI Infrastructure
Developer of quantum computing infrastructure that allows companies to build and deploy advanced generative AI and other LLMs, Zapata Computing, has closed $4.9M towards a $20M total offering. They last raised a $38M Series B in 2020 led by Comcast Ventures, Pitango and Prelude Ventures. Zapata’s platform, Orquestra, maximizes today’s advanced compute resources and future quantum devices for companies building for industrial AI and partners with companies like NVIDIA, Microsoft, and IBM. They recently earned a patent for Robust Amplitude Estimation (RAE), effectively reducing the runtime and resources required for industrial quantum algorithms.
AllSpice | $6M | DevOps
Software git platform for hardware engineers that allows the controlled evolution of hardware design files, AllSpice, has raised $6M from 8 total investors. Founded by Valentina Ratner and Kyle Dumont while at Harvard both getting a joint engineering master’s and MBA in 2019, AllSpice aims to be a DevOps ecosystem inspired by GitHub for hardware. The company raised a $3.2M Seed round co-led by Bowery Capital and Root Ventures, with participation from Flybridge. A TechCrunch 2022 feature has more.
REIN | $11.5M | InsurTech
Provider of white-label embedded insurance programs for enterprises, REIN, has raised $11.5M from 22 investors towards a total offering amount filed for $13M. REIN allows companies to build and launch their desired insurance programs. They teamed up with Liberty Mutual in 2017 to launch DroneInsurance.com, and have since expanded to more verticals, including a commercial auto insurance program for Volvo. They have previously raised over $20M from the likes of Shasta Ventures, Sandbox Industries and Kiplin Capital.
Allonnia | $30M | Climate Tech
Ginkgo Bioworks-spinout and developer of remediation, upcycling and valorization technology for industrial waste management, Allonnia, has raised an additional $30M towards their Series A in an extension round led by Bison Ventures. Allonnia’s platform aims to tackle waste challenges across metals, plastics, and other contaminants by engineering microbes for environmental applications. Across two products, Allonnia can remove ~99% of target PFAS from contaminated water and degrade 99% of the cancer-causing chemical 1,4-dioxane in groundwater.
CubicPV | $33M | Climate Tech
Solar manufacturing and materials company, CubicPV, closed $33M towards their two-traunched $103M Series C round led by SCG Cleanergy and Siam Cement Public Company with participation from Hunt Energy Enterprises and Breakthrough Energy Ventures. CubicPV’s portfolio of silicon and perovskite technologies provide a semiconductor combination for high-efficiency tandem modules for solar manufacturers. The company plans to use the funding for its U.S. factory plans and tandem product roadmap to build 10 gigawatts (GW) of wafer production in the US. Listed as a Director is MIT legend Robert Metcalfe, inventor of the ethernet.
Extras…
CrypCreate | $125K | Who Knows (No, seriously, if you know, ping me)
Listed as executives on this ultra-stealth-mode company’s Form D filing are three MIT computer science graduates, Samir Dutta, Noah Faro, and Kunal Tangri. CrypCreate, a company that would win hardest-to-investigate if Boston Tech Deals did superlatives, has raised $125K from 2 total investors. Samir Dutta is also the founder of Farsight, a company leveraging generative AI to help brands hyper-personalize their e-commerce experiences. Noah Faro is also the founder of Portal. Both Samir and Noah were featured as founders at Imagination In Action’s Web 3 Summit in June.
EdLight | Accelerator Announcement | EdTech
46 companies were announced as recipients of this year’s Google for Startups Black Founders Fund and Latino Founders Fund, and among them was EdLight, a company that lets teachers quickly see and give feedback on students’ work. Google’s program gives $150K equity-free to these 46 companies, as well as sales and fundraising training, technical support from Google mentors, $100K in Google Cloud credits, and mental health coaching from a team of Black and Latino therapists. Pretty sweet deal.
Paerpay | Accelerator Announcement | FinTech
Another Black Founders Fund announcement! Paerpay offers contactless payments for restaurants and their guests without the need for apps, downloads, or hardware.
Epoch Biotech | $720K | Healthcare
Epoch Biotech was another tough one. Listed as the only Executive on the Form D is Michael Aceti, a seasoned finance executive who is currently an independent consultant having acted primarily as a fractional CFO for several biotech companies. Epoch Biotech is without an online presence.
All for now!
Your Macro Briefing + Headlines 📉
Covering the upcoming numbers to watch for (🔜) , the relevant numbers of last week (🔙), and the tech headlines of the last two weeks (🆕).
🔜 Economy watch this week:
🗓 Earnings calendar to watch this week:
🌎 Global stage: Leaders are gathering at the G20 Summit in India through today, “discussing items including reform of multilateral development banks, debt relief for stressed developing nations and sustainable finance.”
🇺🇦 Separately, the U.N. General Assembly is expected to debate the situation of occupied territories of Ukraine today.
🔙 Economy watch last two weeks: Lots.
📉 Recession no more?: This year's June CPI marks the 1-year anniversary of the cyclical high of 9.1% last summer. A year later, economists’ are now predicting the likelihood of a recession within the next year is 54%, down from 61%, according to a WSJ poll.
📣 And the crowd goes wild: A positive inflation report, the Consumer Price Index print, released last week shows headline, core, and supercore (core minus food, energy, housing) inflation fell to their lowest numbers on an annual basis since 2021. Although these are positive indicators (the S&P 500 and Nasdaq responded by hitting new 52-week highs), the report would be unlikely to change the Fed’s plan to hike 25 bps this month. Now that we're through CPI, the market will turn back to earnings as the path to new potential highs.
This month, likely as a result of lower prices and a healthy jobs market, The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment Index reached its highest point since September 2021.
💼 Jobs: New filings for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell from 250k to 237k last week. Continuing claims rose a bit last month but still remain low. Meanwhile, continued wage growth moderation was seen as wage growth for both job seekers and stayers fell to their lowest numbers since 2021. All positive indicators recession.
⚡️ Energy: Rocky Mountain Institute predicts that by 2023, wind and solar energy will generate more than 1/3 of the world’s electricity and the cost of solar power will halve by the same date.
🏙 CRE: Vacancy rates at downtown office buildings nationwide have increased by 5.6 percentage points since the fourth quarter of 2019, reaching 17.8% in the first quarter of 2023.
👥 M&A: The slowdown in venture funding in recent months has driven startups strapped for cash to more intensely look to larger companies for M&A exit opportunities.
An interesting analysis on recent tech M&A activity from Crunchbase here.
🆕 AI Headlines (because at this point, we need a separate section):
🤖 Yes, please help us to understand the true nature of the universe, Elon: Elon Musk formally announced the formation of xAI, a new AI company aimed at understanding "the true nature of the universe" that will draw from a heavy bench of industry veterans and will compete with OpenAI.
🎪 Sneak peak: Apple released its first public beta of iOS 17.
⭐️ All-new: Stability AI, the company behind the AI image generation tool Stable Diffusion, just released Stable Doodle, a sketch-to-image tool.
🤑 Bandwagoner: KPMG’s tax, audit, and consulting services are about to be leveled-up, big time- the accounting firm announced it will be investing $2B in AI and cloud services in collaboration with Microsoft to up its tech enablement.
🆕 Headlines
🤗 Birth control for all: Last week, the FDA approved the first over-the-counter birth control pill, Opill. It will most likely be available at stores and online retailers nationwide in early 2024.
🏡 Commercial to residential: Boston has launched a new program incentivizing the conversion of underutilized office space into residential space, offering a 25% property tax cut to developers who convert their office buildings into housing, and requiring developers to set aside at least 10% of the units in each converted building as affordable housing.
📈 Steep: Tickets for Messi’s US debut for soccer club Inter Miami are being resold at $110K.
🔥 Khan under fire: FTC chair Lina Khan has faced backlash regarding her stance on Big Tech after losing a bid to block Microsoft’s $70B Activision-Blizzard acquisition, and opening a case against OpenAI that questions whether ChatGPT harmed users.
🇬🇧 An old system: Britain's National Health Service, Britain’s socialized medicine program, has been plagued by shortages and delays. On Thursday, around 46,000 doctors went on strike over pay and working conditions.
🇺🇦 Ukraine and Russia: Last week, Russia single-handedly put the global food security of entire populations at risk after announcing it will suspend a UN-backed agreement originally signed in the early days of the war establishing a means for the delivery of key Ukrainian grains globally. Wheat prices jumped 3.5% immediately after news broke.
The US recently supplied Ukraine with controversial cluster bombs- an action thought to be needed to boost Ukraine's counteroffensive. Russia has since threatened to retaliate if Ukraine puts them to use.
Explosions hit Kerch Bridge, one of the main brides between annexed Crimea and Russia’s south. Russian officials called the incident a "terrorist attack" that was staged by Ukrainian special forces involving two sea drones. Ukraine has not claimed responsibility.
🏦 Never leaving: Bob Iger’s two year CEO extension was approved unanimously by the board, and he has a long fix-it list. He’s hinted at selling linear TV assets (ESPN, ABC, Disney Channel) and perhaps spinning off some.
📉 Give it up already: Tucker Carlson plans to start a new subscription media company with former GW Bush White House advisor, Neil Patel after his dramatic showdown with Fox News earlier this year.
🔋 Climate change is expensive: The Florida homeowners insurance faces a $35B shortfall after struggling with the rising costs of covering damage from natural disasters, and Farmers Insurance is the latest to act on it- pulling out of Florida’s homeowners insurance market after 70 years.
👋 Bye Bye Bye -NSYNC: A part of their ongoing bankruptcy liquidation, Bed Bath and Beyond has announced it will shut down all of its Buy Buy Baby stores, a company they acquired for $67M in 2007, amounting to 120 stores across the country.
🥗 Food tech takeover: Chipotle just announced an investment and rollout of Vebu, a robot that peels avocados on demand. This comes after Sweetgreen opened a fully automated store in Illinois and Starbucks announced investment into coffee-making automation.
Events
🧑💼 Tech and Biz
Tuesday, July 25th 5-7PM: CALDWELL and Fidelity host, Catalyst Connections: Empowering Innovators and Investors.
🤗 Other
Tuesday-Saturdays, 8PM through Aug. 6th: Shakespeare on the Common performs Macbeth as their annual open-air show on Parkman Bandstand in the Common. Chairs rent for $10, and it’s a five-act show, so remember to bring snacks, or order the three course Shakespeare meal from Boston Chops.
July 26th- Aug 2: NAACP’s national convention at the Boston Convention Center in the Seaport. Kamala Harris will be in town delivering the keynote address.
Through Aug 15th: In celebration of MassArt’s 150th anniversary, the Tradition and Innovation showcase at the Massachusetts Historical Society showcases art, clothing and innovations made by students.