• observIQ

  Participated · Series B · Oct 2016

  Blue Medora is an IT monitoring integration company that interconnects over 150 technologies across cloud computing, on-premise hardware and virtual desktops. The company recently introduced BindPlane, an IT monitoring integration service that collects and provides data across the entire stack, identifies performance issues, and eliminates blind spots with built-in dashboards for centralized collection and reporting of rich dimensional data. Blue Medora serves more than 350 marquee brands, including Chase, Delta and Safeway. It received a $10M growth investment from Edison Partners and intends to use the funds to accelerate growth in the enterprise market. As part of the financing, Edison Partners’ Lenard Marcus joined Blue Medora’s board of directors. Nathan Owen is CEO and co-founder and leads the company from Grand Rapids, MI. Blue Medora is a Grand Rapids, MI-based provider of integration software for common application performance management, cloud management and database management platforms. Its software extends cloud management, APM and IT operational analytics platforms by adding health, performance and relationship data on underlying compute, storage and network infrastructure. The company also offers SelectStar, a database performance-monitoring platform that combines database and cloud infrastructure monitoring to track and optimize critical database performance and availability metrics. Led by CEO and co-founder Nathan Owen, Blue Medora recently closed an $8M Series B1 to support growth. The company intends to use the proceeds to expand sales, marketing and R&D investments. The Series B1 was led by First Analysis with participation from existing investors Lewis and Clark, Wakestream Ventures and eLabs Ventures. Blue Medora creates software that offers a single view of applications, databases and infrastructure to resolve IT issues, increase uptime and optimize performance. The company is known for developing extensions for virtualized and application management platforms such as Oracle, IBM, VMware vRealize and New Relic. Last month it launched SelectStar, a SaaS-based solution that unifies database and cloud infrastructure monitoring. Blue Medora intends to use new funds to increase customer adoption, channel growth, global presence and technology partnerships. Led by co-founder and CEO Nathan Owen, the company has raised $14.5M in total capital since its inception. It is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Blue Medora provides cloud-based software solutions that enable administrator teams to work collaboratively on infrastructure to avoid downtime, resolve performance problems and make predictive insights using advanced analytics. The company supports VMware’s vRealize Operations and Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control platforms and plans to continue integrating its software into additional cloud management platforms. Led by co-founder and CEO Nathan Owen, Blue Medora intends to use new funding to grow its engineering, sales and marketing teams. The announcement states the company has raised $6.0M in total funding following the latest round. The company is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and will expand platform integrations as a primary product development focus. No operating metrics were disclosed in the article. Blue Medora develops virtualization and cloud monitoring and management plugins that extend popular enterprise management systems such as Oracle Enterprise Manager and IBM Tivoli. The company has produced a range of certified integration products that extend monitoring and management to cloud, virtualization, ERP, CRM, enterprise directory and messaging software. It is working on systems management and monitoring solutions to extend Oracle EM's virtualization capabilities through VMware integration. Blue Medora intends to use new funding to continue to expand and to commercialize its plugins. The company was founded in 2007 and is led by CEO Nathan Owen. It currently employs 22 people and expected to add another 13 employees in the next 18 months.

• VNN

  Participated · Equity · Sep 2015

  Varsity News Network operates an online communication platform for high-school athletic departments, offering customized websites, mobile apps and an advertising network. The platform also produces media content targeting athletes and parents. It is used by more than 1,500 schools across 40 states. The company plans to use freshly raised capital for national expansion and to launch a mobile app. With the scheduled release of VNN 2.0 in early 2016, users will be able to create profiles to connect with families and teammates and upload and share content. Founded in 2011 by CEO Ryan Vaughn and based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the company recently closed a $3.7M funding round led by Arsenal Venture Partners. Varsity News Network (VNN) provides turnkey websites for high school athletic departments that aggregate player stats, dynamic schedules and rich media pulled from social channels. The product offers affordable, easily managed, data-rich sites that give all players visibility beyond local media coverage. VNN has grown to 250 schools in 14 states and says it supports hundreds of thousands of students and their families. The company is Grand Rapids, Mich.-based and was started just over two years ago. VNN raised an additional $3 million to scale nationwide and to launch its first app. Prior capital included $552K from the Michigan Pre-Seed Capital Fund and a $1.09M partial close last February. Varsity is a Grand Rapids, Michigan–based news network that develops custom online publications covering high school sports. Launched in July 2010 through Momentum-MI, the network is a collaborative effort between traditional and community sports journalists. It aims to provide media coverage for every high school sport, from football to field hockey. The company says it will use the recent funding to expand its commercialization efforts. Varsity is actively hiring a Sales & Marketing Account Executive to support growth and monetization.

• Roost

  Participated · Series A · Sep 2015

  Roost provides a home telematics platform and consumer devices including the Roost Smart Battery and the Roost Smart Water Leak and Freeze Detector. The company sells primarily through insurance carriers that deploy devices directly to policyholders, pairing hardware with a digital mobile app to drive engagement, retention and acquisition. Roost targets reduction of claim costs from fire and water perils, a market the article cites as costing $20B per year in the US. Led by co-founder and CEO Roel Peeters, the company intends to use new capital to continue product development and to expand new product services for insurance partners. The business is based in Sunnyvale, California. The article reports Roost has raised $17M in total funding to date. Roost’s core product is a $35 smart battery that fits in most smoke detectors and adds smartphone notifications, low-battery alerts, alarm notifications, and the ability to silence alarms. The company takes a retrofit approach to bring smart-home functionality to existing devices rather than requiring consumers to buy new hardware. Roel Peeters is CEO and the company is positioning the product for broad consumer adoption by leveraging familiar installation patterns. Roost previously accumulated nearly $100,000 in Kickstarter pledges in 2014. Today the company is expanding operations and gearing up for a commercial launch supported by new institutional funding. The product and go-to-market focus aim to lower barriers to entry for smart-home adoption. Roost is a Sunnyvale, CA-based developer of smart home technology. The company has developed a patent-pending connected platform intended to allow mainstream consumers to enter the smart home space. Its initial hardware solution, which uses an innovative retrofit approach to the connected home, is planned to be announced this fall. The product will be sold at a retail price below $50 and will be coupled with a mobile app that manages home data. Roel Peeters serves as CEO, James Blackwell as CTO, and David Henry as CMO. Financially, Roost has raised $975K in seed funding from investors including DCM Ventures, Jason Krikorian, Legend Star and angel investors.

• Sportsman Tracker

  Led · Equity · Jan 2015

  Sportsman Tracker offers a mobile app that provides maps, hunting and fishing locations, ways to record field results, and a proprietary algorithm that predicts optimal times and places to hunt or fish. The app targets both hunters and fishers so it is used year-round rather than seasonally. The company says its algorithm generated more than 4 million predictions and the app saw 270,000 users during the 2014 hunting season; its user base previously hit 80,000. The company traces early support to Start Garden, which awarded founder Jeffrey Courter $5,000 in May 2013 and later invested $100,000 after the user milestone. Sportsman Tracker aims to scale its platform and become an outdoor-sports destination for a broad range of sportsmen. Its recent funding is intended to support scaling and market adoption.

• Exo

  Participated · Seed · Sep 2014

  Exo produces protein bars that use cricket powder as the primary protein source. The bars contain about 13 grams of protein per serving and are sold in Whole Foods, Equinox gyms, and Wegman’s. The product launched via a Kickstarter that raised $20,000 in the first three days and began in the co-founders’ kitchen; co-founders include Greg Sewitz and Gabi Lewis. Exo outsources cricket grinding to third-party operators; the article cites retail cricket powder costs around $30 per pound, with roughly 3,000–4,000 crickets per pound. High production cost and occasional stock shortages have been challenges for the company. The new funding is intended to help scale the business, reduce costs at scale, address stocking issues, and support development of new cricket-based products. Exo makes healthy food products using insect (cricket) protein and currently offers four flavors: Cocoa Nut, PB&J, Apple Cinnamon, and Blueberry Vanilla. Co-founded by Greg Sewitz and Gabi Lewis, the company focuses on producing tasty, nutritious protein bars made from crickets. Exo plans to use its newly raised capital to scale production, make key hires, and expand its product line. The company secured $1.2M in seed funding from investors that include Collaborative Fund, Start Garden and Tim Ferriss. Exo was selected for AccelFoods' inaugural class and received a six-figure investment from AccelFoods' dedicated investment fund during the six-month program, along with investments from many of AccelFoods' limited partners. The funding and accelerator support position Exo to increase manufacturing capacity and broaden its retail and product offerings. Exo produces protein bars made from cricket flour combined with dates, cocoa, coconut and almond butter, sweetened with raw honey. The bars contain about 10g of protein and, according to the company, the cricket flour has more protein than beef. The reviewer found the bar mildly sweet, not noticeably “buggy,” though an early version was crumbly and a bit crunchy from coconut chips. Exo promotes crickets as a more sustainable protein source that avoids the environmental and antibiotic issues the team attributes to conventional livestock. The company ran a Kickstarter campaign that raised $20,000 in three days to fund construction of a factory to produce its bug-based snacks. The reviewer is uncertain about mass-market appeal but recommends trying the bars for a healthier office option.

No current team members are available.