Led · Series A · Aug 2025

Verdata provides proprietary commercial risk data and analytics to automate partner assessments and continuous monitoring across the B2B relationship lifecycle. Its platform delivers verified cross-industry insights on business identity, financial stability, service reliability, and regulatory compliance, supported by a proprietary network of more than 20 million active U.S. businesses. The company’s solutions are used in SMB lending, POS financing, commercial insurance, and embedded finance to reduce fraud, manage compliance, and prioritize high-impact workflows. Verdata announced an $8 million Series A to accelerate product innovation, strengthen customer support, and extend its reach across key industries. The platform aims to reduce manual intervention, mitigate fraud and compliance risks, and unlock new revenue opportunities through scalable, objective risk assessments. Verdata provides a counterparty data and insight network that helps finance and payments companies mitigate risk through a proprietary contributed database augmented with public and third‑party fraud, licensing, and verification data. The platform delivers deep behavioral insights and comprehensive predictive analytic solutions for retail financing companies, payment service providers and SME lenders. Initial core products include a partner onboarding platform plus continuous monitoring and notification capabilities across a company’s partner portfolio. Verdata also offers a Complaint Hub that provides unified communication, workflow efficiencies, seller-centric visibility, and insights for managing consumer-related disputes and complaints. The company is led by CEO Mike Mondelli and is based in Atlanta, GA. Verdata raised seed funding and intends to use the proceeds to continue expanding operations and its business reach.

Participated · Series B · May 2024

Aeropay is a Chicago-based provider of pay-by-bank solutions that began by serving cannabis retailers and gaming companies. The company built a bank-aggregator called Aerosync that connects over 12,000 banks and exposes open APIs for customizable integrations. Aeropay uses Automated Clearing House (ACH) rails to enable direct bank-to-bank transfers, enabling regulatory-compliant, cashless and contactless payments in-store and online without card networks, apps or new hardware. Merchants can accept payments via QR codes or digital-wallet flows and integrate Aeropay with existing systems, which the company says reduces fraud and return risk. Aeropay reported 10x revenue growth over the past year, is processing over $1 billion in annual volume, and reached cash-flow profitability in Q4 2023. The company plans to use new funding to grow go-to-market, technical, compliance, risk and customer-care teams. AeroPay is a Chicago, IL-based API-driven digital payments platform that powers bank transfer payments for businesses. Led by CEO and founder Daniel Muller, the platform processes payments for hundreds of brick-and-mortar and eCommerce businesses across sectors including non-profits, restaurants, retail, technology, and cannabis. The company has seen notable traction in the cannabis vertical and partners with ancillary providers such as Blackbird and Olla to accelerate growth in that market. AeroPay closed a $5+m funding round to support hiring and product development. The company plans to use the funds to recruit new talent and build out additional product features. The article cites industry context that Illinois surpassed $1 billion in legal cannabis sales in 2020 and that the sector is estimated to contribute $130 billion to the economy by 2024.

Participated · Series A · Oct 2020

Gig Wage operates a FinTech payroll platform that enables employers to instantly pay 1099 workers and provides independent contractors an efficient way to receive payments. Founded in 2014 and based in Dallas, the company serves the 1099 workforce. It raised $3.25M in venture debt from Silicon Valley Bank, which the company intends to deploy into key growth areas. Gig Wage has raised $16.45M to date from backers including Green Dot Corporation, Silicon Valley Bank, Foundry Group, Continental Investors, Techstars and Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund. The company also announced several senior hires, including Clarisa Lindenmeyer as Chief of Staff to the CEO and Chief Brand Officer, alongside additions to its go-to-market and executive teams. Management additions are intended to build the Office of the CEO and grow the brand image, experience and promise both internally and externally. Gig Wage provides payroll, payment, and banking services tailored to the gig marketplace. The company operates a payments platform that integrates payroll and banking functionality for gig workers. In October 2020 it closed a $7.5M Series A led by Green Dot, strengthening its financial position. As part of the deal Green Dot will act as Gig Wage's infrastructure bank partner, adding banking services to Gig Wage's payment services platform. The round also included Continental Investors, Techstars, Rise of the Rest and others. Gig Wage is based in Dallas, Texas and was founded in 2014.

Led · Equity · Apr 2019

Sezzle announced a senior debt financing arranged by Bastion Management. The facility is for $150 million with an accordion feature that can expand availability up to $225 million. Bastion Management agented the investment. The announcement was made via PR Newswire on May 17, 2024 from Stamford, Conn. The reporting notes that the PressBee team verified the original PR Newswire item and that it may have been partially modified or quoted. No operating metrics, product details, or additional financial terms were disclosed in the article. Sezzle is a Minneapolis, MN-based fintech that provides a buy-now-pay-later payment platform enabling merchants to offer interest-free installment plans and increase consumer purchasing power. The company is led by CEO Charlie Youakim and CRO Paul Paradis. It raised $5.6M in a round led by Continental Investors, which will serve as pre-IPO capital. Sezzle plans to use the financing to expand growth in North America, fund future product innovations, and invest in additional sales and marketing resources. The company is advancing toward an initial public offering on the Australian Securities Exchange and expects to raise an additional $20M there to fund continued growth. Sezzle is a financial technology company that offers interest-free installment plans for online shoppers. It provides a payment platform that gives consumers additional purchasing power via interest-free installments, leveraging a proprietary underwriting model to make credit decisions. The company does not charge consumers interest and only offers its product to customers it believes can responsibly make the purchase. Sezzle’s technology is positioned to increase the purchasing power of young “prime-to-be” shoppers who otherwise may not be able to pay the full price at once. First-time shoppers can sign up quickly during checkout and repeat customers get a one-click purchase experience. Sezzle was founded in 2016 and is based in Minneapolis, MN; leadership includes CEO Charlie Youakim and COO/CRO Paul Paradis.

Led · Equity · Dec 2018

Winestyr is a full-service direct-to-consumer wine marketplace that curates small-production wines and makes them accessible to consumers across the country via wine clubs, wine gifts, and its marketplace platform. The company was co-founded by Scott Washburn (Chief Growth Officer), Bob Wilson (Chief Executive Officer), and John Wilson (Chief Operating Officer). Based in Chicago, IL, Winestyr operates a showroom model alongside its digital subscription and gift offerings. The company raised $3M in its first institutional round of funding. Winestyr plans to use the proceeds to bring its showroom model to new markets and to accelerate digital growth of its wine subscription and wine gift products. Winestyr curates wines around activities and life events, offering irreverent “wine playlists” instead of traditional scoring. The site partners directly with small wineries and forwards orders to producers rather than holding inventory, enabling access to roughly 83% of wineries unavailable in local stores. Winestyr caps shipping at $10 per order and cuts out wholesalers to improve price and selection. The company has signed up 22 wineries and is targeting 60 by January as it scales supply. Founders Bob and John Wilson taste featured wines for quality control and run live chat support to help customers choose. The site is live, taking orders, and the company completed a $550,000 seed round.