Led · Equity · Feb 2024

Founded in 2017 and based in Bengaluru, Yulu began as a bike-sharing startup and pivoted toward serving the delivery economy during the COVID-19 pandemic. The company operates roughly 50,000 electric vehicles, logs about 1.6 million miles each week, and powers more than 750,000 deliveries per day. About 95% of Yulu’s revenue comes from renting electric bikes to gig workers on weekly subscriptions, with the remainder from station-based rentals in Bengaluru. Yulu currently operates in 12 Indian cities, running its own operations in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, and Hyderabad, and partners with franchisees in eight other markets while targeting roughly 20 cities within the next year. The startup is introducing a full-sized, higher-speed scooter called Yulu Express (about one-third of the planned 200,000-vehicle fleet) and is moving toward profitability before interest and taxes next year after achieving positive EBITDA in the last financial year. Yulu reported revenue growth of seven-fold between fiscal 2023 and fiscal 2026, though it did not disclose specific revenue figures.

Participated · Series D · Feb 2024

Uhnder develops commercial digital radar chips and software serving automotive, industrial, and defense customers. Its patent-pending technology aims to improve azimuth and elevation measurement accuracy to enable advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) and autonomous driving. The company has shipped over 200,000 of its next-generation digital radar chips and reports dozens of customer engagements across its target sectors. Founded in 2015 by Dr. Manju Hegde and Curtis Davis and based in Austin, Texas, Uhnder targets applications ranging from safety to convenience. The company intends to use new funding to expand its market presence. Uhnder develops fully digital 4D software-defined imaging radar using Digital Code Modulation (DCM) to replace traditional analog frequency modulation, delivering higher angular resolution, interference rejection, and High Contrast Resolution (HCR). Its flagship product, Voxel, is expected to be in production and automotive qualified in 2021. The company supplies both chips and system solutions for perception stacks and says customers requiring best-in-class radar for autonomous systems are fueling demand. Sensata Technologies plans to use Uhnder’s digital imaging radar chip across applications in mining, agriculture, aerospace, and construction. Uhnder was launched in 2015 and is headquartered in Austin, Texas. The company positions its technology as enabling improved safety and smaller, lower-power radar footprints for autonomy and other automation applications.

Participated · Equity · Feb 2024

Niron Magnetics manufactures magnets that substitute iron and nitrogen for rare earth elements. The company is building a plant in Sartell, Minnesota, and is looking for a location for a second plant. It received a $150 million loan from the Pentagon announced by the White House and President Trump as part of broader mining-related funding. The administration framed the investment as a move to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign-produced magnets. Coverage did not disclose revenue, users, or prior funding rounds. The company’s near-term plans center on expanding domestic manufacturing capacity through the Sartell facility and a prospective second plant.

Participated · Series A · Mar 2022

Sanctuary AI develops human-like intelligence for general-purpose robots intended to help organizations work more safely, efficiently, and sustainably. The company was founded in 2018 by Olivia Norton, who serves as Chief Technology and Product Officer. Sanctuary intends to use the new funds to accelerate progress toward bringing AI into the physical world. Its customers and investors span industries across Canada, the US, and other countries. Existing investors and partners include Accenture, Bell, Export Development Canada, Evok Innovations, Magna, SE Health, Verizon Ventures, and Workday Ventures. The company has received over $140M in total investment to date, including a $30M Strategic Innovation Fund contribution from the Government of Canada in November 2022. Sanctuary AI develops AI-powered humanoid general-purpose robots designed to perform a wide variety of work tasks safely and effectively. Its flagship robot, Phoenix, is driven by the Carbon AI control system that mimics subsystems found in the human brain—memory, sight, sound and touch—and translates natural language into real‑world actions. Phoenix was recognized by TIME as one of the Best Inventions of 2023 and has performed more than 100 tasks at a Mark’s retail store in Langley, British Columbia, demonstrating fine manipulation and human-level hand dexterity. The company targets industries facing labor shortages, including post and parcel, manufacturing, retail and logistics warehousing, where its robots can complement and collaborate with human workers. Sanctuary embeds Explainable AI in Phoenix to surface reasoning, task and motion plans that can be defined and audited. Founded in 2018 and based in Vancouver, Canada, Sanctuary’s team includes founders and employees with prior experience at D-Wave, Kindred, Amazon, Microsoft and Softbank Robotics. Sanctuary Cognitive Systems develops human-like intelligence for general-purpose robots using AI, cognition, and robotics technologies. Founded in 2018 by Geordie Rose, Suzanne Gildert, Olivia Norton, and Ajay Agrawal and based in Vancouver, BC, the company aims to create robots that assist humans with difficult or dangerous tasks. Its stated goals include improving workplace safety and efficiency, creating new jobs, and reducing the impact of labour shortages. Sanctuary also envisions its technology enabling exploration and settlement in outer space. The company plans to use recent funding to expand operations and advance its development efforts. Financially, it closed a US$58.5M Series A in 2022 to support those plans.

Participated · Equity · Mar 2021

Populus offers a software-as-a-service platform that collects data from shared fleets (scooters, e-bikes, car-sharing) and other mobility providers and shares that information with cities, mapping platforms and third parties via an API. The product is used by more than 100 cities across the U.S. and Israel and has expanded into commercial fleets, ride-hail and autonomous-vehicle use cases. Its curb management feature gives cities visibility into curb usage so they can set dynamic pricing, manage congestion and craft parking policies that can be enforced through the platform. Populus says curb data can steer fleet operators to lower-conflict parking areas and incentivize smaller, more carbon-efficient delivery modes, aiding emissions and air-quality goals. The company is pursuing pilots in major European cities while remaining mostly based in North America and headquartered in San Francisco. Populus has about 25 employees and plans to double headcount over the next year; it will use new capital to scale its core product, expand curb management software and make strategic hires. Populus provides a software-as-a-service platform that pulls telemetry from fleets of shared e-bikes, scooters, mopeds and car-sharing vehicles and delivers that data to cities and regulators. Cities use the Populus API to share rules of the road, preferred parking areas, bike-lane information and other policy data with mapping platforms and third parties. Last year the company added a street manager feature for communicating temporary policies (slow/shared streets, outdoor dining, construction) and a curb management feature that enables cities to set dynamic pricing and manage commercial delivery demand. Populus has contracts with more than 80 cities — including Oakland, San Diego and Tel Aviv — and works with over 25 micromobility operators. The company plans to use new capital to expand to more cities and aims to triple its city footprint over the next 18 months. Populus was founded in 2017 and is based in San Francisco; it has raised nearly $9 million to date. Populus provides a platform that securely ingests and hosts vehicle and trip data from shared-mobility operators and offers tools for cities and operators to analyze usage patterns. The product enables city planners to view where people park and ride scooters and bikes to inform placement of parking areas, bike lanes and curbside management. Populus also offers real-time rideshare data to support curb pricing and management, and it sells the platform on a subscription basis to cities and operators. The company works with jurisdictions including Arlington County, Washington, D.C., and cities in the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles regions, and it partnered with Lime to facilitate data sharing from LimePod. Populus launched its core product in September 2018; CEO and co-founder Regina Clewlow and co-founder Fletcher Foti previously worked together on transportation forecasting starting in 2012. Financially, the company has raised a total of $3.85 million to date.