Resurrecting the Dodo, Dimension Capital Raises $350mm, and Laura Deming on Longevity - Issue #3
Also, could ChatGPT do your job and OpenAI introduces ChatGPT Plus for $20/month
Welcome to the third issue of DTVC, a publication dedicated to sharing information related to deep technology investments, deals, headlines, reports, and much more. Deep technology is where engineering meets scientific discoveries. Scroll down to see what’s in store this week.
Deals of the Week (January 24 - 31, 2023)
Source: Colossal Biosciences; Colossal’s lead paleogeneticist Beth Shapiro, left, and company co-founder Ben Lamm.
Venture Fundings
Sensoteq, a Belfast, Northern Ireland-based health-tech startup, that designs sensor technology to monitor heavy-duty industrial machinery, has raised £500,000 led by Whiterock Finance. Founded in 2016, Sensoteq’s products are used in the automotive, pharmaceutical, mining, energy, and waste recycling industries, among others.
Colossal Biosciences, a biotechnology startup with a $1bn+ paper-valuation headquartered in Dallas, TX, announced a $150mm Series B round from the likes of United States Innovative Technology Fund, In-Q-Tel, Breyer Capital, and Jazz Venture Partners. The company has a de-extinction agenda that includes the wooly mammoth and dodo. Talk about resurrections… Bloomberg has more here.
Spartan Radar, a Southern California startup created by ex-defense industry engineers, raised $17mm in a Series B round to help commercialize sensor software that it says lets even cheap radar units track their surroundings in greater detail and will improve the performance of current hands-free driving systems. The company has raised a total of ~$42mm since inception and the latest round was led by 8VC, IronGate Capital, Primer Movers Lab, MaC VC, and Microsoft.
Q-CTRL, a Sydney, Australia-based quantum computing software firm, raised $27.4mm with Salesforce’s venture arm joining as a new investor on the cap table. Q-CTRL plans to use the funding for sales, marketing, and recruiting. The startup intends to grow its team by 50% this year and booked $15mm in revenue between its quantum computing and quantum sensing divisions last year.
Alto Neuroscience, a Los Altos, CA-based biotechnology startup, raised $25mm from Alpha Wave Ventures, bringing its Series B funding to approximately $60mm. The company is attempting to fix the ‘trial and error’ system in neuroscience drug R&D and will employ the raised capital to investigate four drugs through Phase II readouts.
Greyter, a Canadian developer of residential greywater reuse systems, completed a $10mm Series B round led by Ferguson Ventures and LEN^X. PR Newswire has more information here.
Sentra, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based cybersecurity company, closed $30mm to provide a security layer for data in the cloud. Sentra finds data in the cloud, classifies it according to sensitivity and then offers remediation plans for data security teams. The round was led by Standard Investments with participation from Munich Re Ventures, Moore Strategic Ventures, Xerox Ventures, INT3, Bessemer Venture Partners and Zeev Ventures — bringing its total raised to $53 million.
Boston Metal, headquartered in Woburn, MA, and focused on fully decarbonizing steel production, raised a $120mm Series C from ArcelorMittal S.A., Microsoft Climate Innovation Fund, and SiteGround Capital. The investment will increase green steel production at a pilot facility outside Boston and "will support the site selection and preliminary design of its first green steel plant."
Symbiomics, a Brazil-based biotechnology organization developing biological products containing efficient microbes for multiple applications in agriculture and the environment, raised R$10mm. The company intends to continue building its pipeline that use advanced biotechnology tools to develop high-performance microorganisms.
Grey Wolf, an Oxford, UK-based biotechnology startup which develops immuno-oncology therapeutic technology, raised $49mm in Series B financing from the corporate venture arm of COVID-19 vaccine maker, Pfizer. Founded in 2017, Grey Wolf Therapeutics specialises in combating tumours with its novel anti-cancer treatment. The company is looking to launch medical trials on human patients soon. Additional participants included Oxford Science Enterprises, Earlybird Venture Capital, and Canaan Partners among others.
Hume AI, a NYC, NY-based AI startup, raised a $12.7mm Series A on the premise that it's not enough for AI systems to understand the world's information — they also need to understand human reactions. CEO Alan Cowen said the goal of his technology is to help automated systems recognize when humans are pleased or frustrated. The funding round was led by Union Square Ventures. Axios has more coverage.
Machina Labs, a LA, CA-based tech-centric sheet metal products manufacturer, raised financing from Lockheed Martin Ventures. The investment brings Machina Labs total funding to date to $21.8 million. Machina Labs plans to use the funding to accelerate company growth to meet customer demands, and expand research and development to include more processes and metallurgical offerings.
Precision Neuroscience, a NYC, NY-based brain implant startup, net $41mm in Series B financing led by Forepont Capital Partners, and the group of half a dozen other investors included Steadview Capital and B Capital Group, which jointly led the $12 million Series A in 2021. Precision was co-founded by Mager, a private equity investor, and Benjamin Rapoport, M.D., Ph.D. Rapoport is a neurosurgeon who served as a founding member of Neuralink, where he worked for just over a year between 2017 and 2018.
AMPECO, a Sofia, Bulgaria-headquartered EV charging management platform provider, raised $13mm in a Series A round led by BMW iVentures. Four years after launching, Ampeco says it has pulled in 120 customers in 45 markets, reached 62,000 charging points and doubled in size to over 80 people. TechCrunch has more here.
Deciphex, a Dubin, Ireland-based biotechnology startup, secured an additional €3.9mm in funding bringing its full Series B round tally to €14.4mm. The additional investment, led by Seroba Life Sciences and existing Deciphex investors, will allow Deciphex to continue developing its innovative products and services, to expand its presence in the UK, Canada, the Middle East and the US, and to strengthen its position in the field of digital pathology and AI.
Kuva Systems, a Cambridge, MA-based developer of an infrared imaging system designed to automatically detect and measure emissions and provide operators with an annotated video clip of the leak, raised $11.3mm to scale its technology. More than 20 oil and gas companies use Kuva’s IoT technology to fix and prevent methane leaks and to meet the methane emissions targets in their ESG objectives.
Kirilys Therapeutics, a San Francisco, CA-headquartered developer of multiple-precision oncology therapeutics, announced a Series A investment Global Brain Corporation, a Japan-based early-staged focused venture capital firm. Kirilys’ initial asset is KRLS-017, a novel CDK7 inhibitor with the potential to improve the treatment of multiple cancers.
PASQAL, a Paris, France-based quantum computing startup, raised €100mm in a Series B financing round led by Temasek. Following a neutral atoms based approach, the quantum processor maker will use the new capital to further enhance its R&D efforts to build a 1,000-qubit quantum computer in the short term and fault-tolerant architectures in the long term. Existing investors who’ve continued their support include Quantonation, the Defense Innovation Fund, Daphni, and Eni Next.
Osmo, a Cambridge, MA-based spinout of Google Research, is trying to give computers a smell. The AI startup aims to create the next generation of aroma molecules for perfumes, shampoos, lotions, candles, and other everyday products. Its financial war-chest has been infused with $60mm of capital commitments from the likes Lux Capital, GV, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and numerous others. Wired has more here.
Terra Drone, a Tokyo, Japan-headquartered drone and software manufacturer, raised $14mm from Saudi Aramco’s Wa’ed Ventures. The company will establish a new subsidiary for its operations in Saudi Arabia to conduct drone survey, inspection and unmanned traffic management (UTM) across various projects in Saudi Arabia.
Memfault, a San Francisco, CA-based startup developing an IoT reliability platform that gives developers a more scalable & sustainable process to transform the way they build & operate devices, raised $24mm led by Stripes, with participation from the 5G Open Innovation Lab, Partech and Uncork.Other Fundings
Other Fundings
Teraco Data Environments, Africa’s largest datacenter firm, raised $680mm in funds to facilitate its expansion plans and power build-out. Teraco’s CFO, Samuel Erwin, informed Bloomberg that the company has also set a target to generate 50% of their power from clean energy sources by 2027, and all of it by 2035.
Renalytix, a UK-based developer of AI-enabled clinical diagnostic solutions for kidney health, was awarded a $10mm Horizon Europe grant to advance personalized medicine in treating chronic kidney disease (CKD) throughout Europe and the United States. Learn more from the WSJ.
Elevate Renewable Energy, a Boston, MA-based battery project developer, bolstered its balance sheet through a $150mm investment from ArcLight Capital Partners, who anticipate an increase in renewable power generation in the Northeast, which remains behind other U.S. regions in the use of alternative energy sources.
Exits and New Funds
Dimension Capital, a $350mm venture fund aimed at partnering with founders at the interface of technology and life sciences, was launched by alumni of Lux Capital and Obvious Ventures. Their first fund, for which Dimension was seeking $300 million, closed in December and was oversubscribed at $350 million. Right now, Dimension is an early-stage fund, focused on seed and Series A rounds, and it’s already writing checks. In its first year of operation, Dimension has already started making investments into four portfolio companies: Kaleidoscope Bio, Enveda Biosciences, Lamin AI, and a stealth startup. Forbes has more here.
Istesso, a British developer of immunometabolism drugs, is in talks to merge with Hambro Perks Acquisition, the first London-listed SPAC. Sky News has more information here.
Cloudify, an Israeli developer of cloud orchestration and infrastructure automation, was acquired by Dell for upwards of $100mm. Cloudify raised approximately $8mm from firms like KPN Ventures and Claridge.
News Headlines
The growing tensions around spinout at British universities (FT)
Europe’s deep-tech start-ups raised $17.7bn in 2022, report claims (Silicon Republic)
OpenAI is Making Headlines. It’s Also Seeding Talent Across Silicon Valley (The Information)
Artificial intelligence pioneers back $550mn fund for AI start-ups (FT)
Palantir’s CEO Says Silicon Valley Products Have ‘Obviously Failed’ to Improve World (Bloomberg)
Yes, we have enough materials to power the world with renewable energy (MIT Tech Review)
Could ChatGPT do my job? (MIT Tech Review)
Singapore: A Rising Tiger Economy for Startups and Venture Capital in Asia (Foley & Lardner LLP)
Additional Reading
Product Announcement: Introducing ChatGPT Plus (OpenAI)
News: Cars are rewiring our brains to ignore all the bad stuff about driving (The Verge)
News: Layoffs Broke Big Tech’s Elite College Hiring Pipeline (Wired)
News: ChatGPT Is Making Universities Rethink Plagiarism (Wired)
Op-Ed: Academia’s culture of overwork almost broke me, so I’m working to undo it (Nature)
Commentary: Could Africa be the future for genomics research? (Nature)
Op-Ed: What an Endless Conversation with Werner Herzog Can Teach Us about AI (Scientific American)
Must-Consume Multimedia
Source: Elad Gil; Interview with Reid Hoffman (co-founder of LinkedIn amongst other things)
Source: Dead Cat; a podcast by Eric Newcomer (highly recommended)
Source: World Economic Forum; Interview with Satya Nadella (Chairman and CEO of Microsoft)
Source: The Good Time Show with Aarthi and Sriram; Interview with Laura Deming (Longevity Fund)
Book Recommendations
Support your local bookstore or consider purchasing from Amazon here.
Support your local bookstore or consider purchasing from Amazon here.