Participated · Equity · Aug 2021

VIDROVR offers an end-to-end video analysis platform that indexes and manages live stream and archival video content and turns multimedia into actionable data. Its multimodal computer vision and VRPA technology ingests sources including live television, internet and social media, and CCTV footage to create real-time actions, strategic reports, and workflow automations. The company has launched two products, VIDROVR AMI for making multimedia assets actionable and VIDROVR AWARE for localizing people, objects, and events to modernize physical operations. VIDROVR plans to further enhance its technology and expand sales and marketing following recent funding. Leadership frames the product as a solution to the exponential growth of video content and related misinformation, enabling faster decision-making from image, video, and audio data. The company says it has experienced tremendous growth over the past 12 months. Vidrovr offers search and indexing technology that helps publishers find the most relevant videos to accompany their content. Its system combines transcription, face detection and scene detection to extract granular information from video. The product aims to help publishers better monetize licensed or owned video assets and to recommend related videos, articles, and social posts. Co-founder and CEO Joe Ellis says the company will bring the technology “all the way to the consumer,” enabling publishers to host Vidrovr-style search on their sites. The team developed the core technology while Ph.D. students at Columbia University and was incubated at Techstars NYC and the Verizon Media Tech Venture Studio. The company recently completed a seed financing to support product rollout and expansion.

Participated · Seed · Jan 2021

Bear Flag Robotics develops autonomous technology that enables farm tractors to run autonomously while human supervisors monitor and command fleets from a remote mission control room or personal device. Its software plans optimal field patterns based on growers’ implements and provides predictive and post-run analytics to improve seasonal farming. The company is working with the largest produce and commodity growers in California and Arizona. Bear Flag Robotics was co-founded by Igino Cafiero and Aubrey Donnellan in 2017 and is based in Newark, Calif. In January 2021 it raised a $7.9M seed extension, bringing total funding to date to $12.5M. The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand operations and its business reach. Bear Flag Robotics develops autonomous driving and implement-control technology for agricultural tractors, enabling growers to automate tasks such as spraying, mowing, discing and ripping. Its system allows a single supervisor to operate a fleet of vehicles, reducing labor needs on farms. The company cites research suggesting autonomous robots can lower labor expenses and increase yields by up to 15 percent, partly via reduced soil compaction from smaller tractors. Bear Flag is targeting specialty crops such as nuts, fruits and grapes and aims to deliver yield and cost improvements to growers. The company plans to offer leasing options plus full-service and hybrid (centrally supervised) operational models, with operations slated to begin by the end of 2018. Financially, Bear Flag announced a $3.5M seed round led by True Ventures and has raised $4.5M in total since its 2017 founding; Rohit Sharma of True Ventures joined the board as part of the financing.

Participated · Series E · Oct 2020

Whoop builds wearable fitness and health trackers paired with a subscription service that captures user biometric and performance data. The company ships millions of hardware units globally while operating a recurring-revenue subscription model, which management says makes bookings the most useful operating metric. Whoop exited last year at a $1.1 billion bookings run rate, representing 103% year-over-year growth. It has now raised roughly $900 million in total capital since founding. The company is investing raised capital in hiring and talent, marketing and brand awareness, continued R&D, and accelerating international expansion. Whoop is also pursuing deeper health and medical capabilities, underscored by strategic participation from Abbott and Mayo Clinic in the latest round.