Fintech funding round-up: 15 June 2018
Some good old funding news from the good old USA – and with a juicy Texan theme. Features Strangeworks, Eventador.io, SeriesX, Unchained Capital and ALTR. Xconomy (FinTech Futures’ sister publication) reports.
Strangeworks, an Austin, Texas-based quantum computing start-up, has raised $4 million in a seed round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners. Ecliptic Capital, GreatPoint Ventures, Lux Capital, BoxGroup, and Amplify Partners contributed to the funding.
Strangeworks, which was founded last year by William Hurley, is currently focusing on developing quantum tools related to the aerospace, energy, finance, and pharmaceutical industries. Two years ago, Hurley sold his fintech start-up, Honest Dollar, to Goldman Sachs.
Austin’s LiveOak Venture Partners led a $3.8 million seed round for Eventador.io, a start-up that has developed what it calls “stream-processing-as-a-service” software to enable users to build and manage modern streaming data applications. Other investors include Deep Space Ventures, RSH Ventures, Capital Factory, and Keshif Ventures.
The new funds, which include a conversion of a previous $1.3 million angel round, will be used for sales and marketing in the US and Europe and to make new hires and invest in research and development.
SeriesX, a start-up using Ethereum blockchain technology, has raised $2 million in two rounds of funding, according to a Silicon Hills report.
Investors include Shasta Ventures, Next Coast Ventures, Capital Factory Fund 5, Yeoman’s Capital, Hampstead Park Capital, Rigel Asset Holdings, Array.VC, 11-11 Ventures, and Insiders.
Unchained Capital, a company that lends cash to long-term crypto investors, has raised $2.9 million. Investors include Michael Komaransky, formerly of Cumberland Mining; Brian Spaly, an angel investor and co-founder of Bonobos and Trunk Club; Mike Erwin, and William Hurley of Ecliptic Capital; and Ezra Galston of Starting Line, an early venture investor in the crypto sector.
Unchained Capital was launched in November. “Crypto assets are now a nearly $500 billion asset class, but are functionally invisible to the existing financial system,” Galston says. “Holdings won’t enable consumers to obtain a mortgage, gain credit or serve as collateral. Unchained is bridging that gap.”
A new blockchain start-up has emerged in Austin. ALTR, which uses blockchain technologies for cybersecurity issues, also announced that it has raised $15 million in funding. ALTR only named one investor, John Stafford III, CEO of Ronin Capital, and says the remaining investors were from both institutional and private sources.
ALTR says its platform is “virtually impenetrable to attack” and because it creates a blockchain-stored record of any attempt to impact data or a network. This permanent, unalterable record becomes a disincentive for offenders, the company stated.
