Participated · Equity · Mar 2023

Sora Finance is a San Francisco-based fintech that provides a SaaS platform for credit management and liability optimization to financial advisors, planners, and employers. Its AI-driven debt financing platform covers home, auto, student, and personal loans and uses an "always-on" lending algorithm to surface affordable rates. Sora onboards clients' existing liabilities and executes advanced credit optimization strategies across all loans to maximize clients' net worth. By partnering with wholesale and retail lenders, the company guarantees advisors' clients the lowest cost of debt. Led by co-founders and co-CEOs Siddhartha Oza and Rohit G. Agarwal, Sora intends to use new funding to accelerate growth and expand operations and business reach. The company currently works with over 125 advisory firms and has $275 million in liabilities under management.

Participated · Series C · Aug 2014

Poppin offers colorful, affordable office products and furniture sold direct-to-consumer via its website and through a growing corporate business. Its client roster includes LinkedIn, Rent the Runway, Squarespace, Warby Parker, and the NFL Network, and it serves over 4,000 corporate clients. The company has expanded into wholesale partnerships with national retailers such as The Container Store, Crate & Barrel, Staples, Urban Outfitters, and more than 90 college bookstores, reaching over 1,400 retail locations by back-to-school season. Poppin’s product line includes more than 150 product styles and the team is about 60 people. The company declines to disclose revenue or detailed sales figures. Poppin plans product and site improvements including more user-generated content and enhanced customization and re-ordering features. Poppin operates an e-commerce catalog of design-forward office furniture, accessories, supplies and recently added categories like wall art and lighting. The company serves both consumers and a growing B2B channel, offering free "work stylists" and serving corporate clients including Fab.com, Kate Spade, LinkedIn, Pandora, Rachel Zoe Media Group, SalesForce Marketing Cloud and Warby Parker. On the B2B side the average order size is around $700. Poppin is headquartered in New York with about 32 employees there and roughly half a dozen in China where products are manufactured; it plans to add roughly a dozen more staff by year-end. The company declined to disclose revenue or growth metrics beyond describing performance as "hockey stick"-like. With new funding it plans to expand its product lineup further and move beyond pure e-commerce into brick-and-mortar and other online retail partnerships. Poppin operates an e-commerce store focused on colorful, style-oriented office products and bundles, with site features that let customers browse by color, category, or bundle and use a reordering tool for repeat purchases. The company positions itself to make buying and using office products an extraordinary experience and targets a supposed $300 billion office product market. Poppin plans to expand beyond small supplies into higher-margin furniture and other workplace essentials to boost profitability. The article notes slim margins on items like binders and post-it notes, motivating the move into big-ticket furniture such as desks, chairs, and couches. Co-founder Chris Burch, an investor in Jawbone, PowerMat, and Voss Water, is cited in the coverage. Poppin aims to court large employers that value well-designed, ergonomic office furnishings.