The Venture Codex

Participated · Equity · Nov 2025

CampusKnot’s cloud platform acts as an AI teaching assistant that auto-generates course questions, tracks participation, grades assignments, and summarizes discussions, freeing professors to focus on mentorship and instruction. Instructors can upload syllabi, receive AI-generated activities aligned with learning objectives, manage rewards, and access analytics that link participation to learning outcomes. The system is already in use at 32 universities, including Mississippi State, Texas A&M, Tulane, LSU, and The University of Alabama. To broaden reach, CampusKnot has distribution partnerships with VitalSource and Follett, giving it potential entry to more than 1,000 campuses. Headquartered in Starkville, Mississippi with operations tied to New Orleans, the company plans to hire across sales, engineering, and customer success to meet growing demand. Accelerator backing from Invest Mississippi and Idea Village and early support from Mississippi State University’s Center for Entrepreneurship have helped refine the business model and scale operations. Financially, the firm just secured $1.1 million in new capital to drive nationwide expansion and regional job creation.

Participated · Seed · Sep 2021

Pass It Down operates a cloud-based digital design platform to create interactive experiences for museums, cultural centers, brands and municipalities. Led by founder and CEO Chris Cummings, the company partners with a network of history, sports, and art museums and archives to create NFTs of art, video clips, audio clips and other artifacts. Clients and partners include Porsche, Procter & Gamble, the Museum of Broadcast Communications, and municipalities such as Portland, Ore., Chattanooga, Tenn., and Sarasota, Fla. The company raised nearly $2 million in funding to support the launch and growth of Iconic Moments, an NFT marketplace exclusively for museums and cultural institutions. Pass It Down intends to launch Iconic Moments in the fourth quarter of 2021 and will use the funds to hire additional staff and enhance the marketplace. The company is based in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.