• Mad Street Den

  Led · Seed · Jan 2015

  Mad Street Den, based in Redwood City, California, is led by CEO and founder Ashwini Asokan and develops enterprise AI products. Its Blox platform helps large enterprises create clean and enriched data, power personalized customer experiences, and automate complex document workflows. The company also offers Vue.ai, a unified Visual AI platform for retail that uses image recognition and data science to generate product and customer intelligence and combine these with market insights. Mad Street Den acquired Inturn, a New York-based enterprise solution that helps retailers monetize slow-moving and excess inventory. In January 2023 the company raised $30M in a Series C and intends to use the funds to expand its artificial intelligence offerings across industries. The Series C was led by Avatar Growth Capital. Mad Street Den develops AI technology and a suite of products for retail and e-commerce under the Vue.ai sub-brand, including visual search, AI tagging, personalized homepages and tailored product recommendations. Vue.ai comprises roughly 14 fashion-focused products; the company also builds AI features for mobile gaming, engagement analysis, IoT, photo apps and social media (gaze-tracking, gesture detection). The startup is registered in the U.S. but is principally located in Chennai, India, and maintains offices in London and San Francisco. Founders Anand Chandrasekaran and Ashwani Asokan are ex‑Silicon Valley executives with technical backgrounds; the company was about two-and-a-half years old at the time of the article. On the business side, Mad Street Den reports it has been generating revenue from day one via multi-year, enterprise-style deals typically charged by API calls, and it is focused on scaling rather than immediate profitability. Near-term plans include expanding the San Francisco AI team (to roughly 5–6 members), growing headcount from about 50 to 75, rolling out offline offerings using anonymous video/image recognition with retail partners, and proving scale over the next 12 months. Mad Street Den is a Chennai-based artificial intelligence and computer-vision company founded in mid-2014 by Ashwini Asokan and Anand Chandrasekaran. It provides AI and computer-vision capabilities to businesses worldwide via its cloud-based platform, MADStack, which offers a range of computer-vision modules. The firm's flagship product is a visual-search tool for fashion e-commerce that finds and recommends clothing items based on images. Mad Street Den also serves industries including gaming, ad tech, and analytics (user engagement measurement and market research). The company has raised a seed round of $1.5 million (about Rs 9 crore) and says the funds will be used for technology development. Founders bring industry and academic experience: Ashwini has product and interaction-design experience including Intel and Carnegie Mellon credentials, while Chandrasekaran has an electrical-engineering background with a PhD in Neuroscience and prior industry roles.

• Aspen Aerogels

  Participated · Equity · Oct 2010

  Aspen Aerogels produces aerogel-based thermal insulation and battery materials, including PyroThin®, Cryogel®, and Pyrogel®, aimed at energy infrastructure and EV battery thermal management. The company is focused on electrification and battery-materials initiatives to address thermal runaway and improve lithium-ion battery performance. Management is pursuing capacity expansion, including a planned second aerogel manufacturing facility in Statesboro, Georgia. In August 2024 Aspen arranged a $125 million term loan and a $100 million revolving credit facility with MidCap Financial to reduce its cost of capital and increase financial flexibility. Proceeds from the facilities will be used to cash redeem an existing convertible note; the CFO said the financing supports access to liquidity and profitable revenue growth. Aspen is headquartered in Northborough, Massachusetts, was founded in 2001, employs roughly 201–500 people, and has previously raised $21.5M. Aspen Aerogels supplies reinforced, nanoporous aerogel insulation products and has developed a proprietary blanket form of aerogels. The company’s blanket technology targets a range of markets, including building and construction, chemicals, transportation and oil and gas. Aspen plans to work with BASF to target and rapidly penetrate the European market. The company raised $21.5M (about €15.7M) in an equity financing led by BASF Venture Capital. Aspen was founded in 2001 and is based in Northborough, Massachusetts. It currently employs 120 people.

No current team members are available.