SSR - March 1, 2024

Flippa, a business brokerage, released an analysis of National Science Foundation and Pitchbook data showing the states with the largest growth in VC investment over the past decade. Three southern states ranked in the top ten positions. Louisiana ranked 6th in the nation with a 10.2X increase; Arkansas came in 9th with 9.4X growth; and South Carolina ranked 10th with an 8.4X increase in VC funding over the last 10 years. One could argue that these states had a much lower starting point for equity raises… or an under-reported starting point. According to their dataset, total Louisiana funding in 2012 was only $25.75 million – growing to $324.45 million by 2022.

Louisiana

Congratulations to The Idea Village, one of 16 national recipients of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Ocean-based Climate Resilience Accelerator program. As such, The Idea Village will receive $250K to support its CLIMATEx Accelerator Program. The Idea Village also announced its keynote speaker for NOEW (March 11 – 16th): Edrizio De La Cruz, ex-visiting partner at technology startup accelerator Y Combinator and co-founder of the fintech company Arcus, which was acquired by MasterCard in 2021. In line with NOEW, the Tulane Business Model Competition also announced the finalists for its pitch competition. Six student-run ventures will compete for a share of the $125K cash prize. The finalists hail from all over the US, but two Tulane teams made the cut: Tipzy and Informuta. Go Green! After that? Baton Rouge Entrepreneurship Week (BREW) is coming up May 7-9th. In its 13th year, the week will include a series of workshops, panel discussions, networking events, and a pitch competition. Mark your calendar and register today.

Alabama

Birmingham-based Yuva Biosciences raised a $7.5M seed round led by VentureSouth. Yuva applies mitochondrial science to create breakthrough products for skin care and hair care. Congratulations to a student team from the University of Alabama at Birmingham for winning first place and $10K in the statewide Innovate Alabama: Entrepreneurship Hackathon. The hackathon’s focus was on addressing the obstacles faced by rural entrepreneurs in Alabama.

Arkansas

NayaOne, a Venture Center FIS Fintech alumni, raised $4.M in funding led by EJF Capital. NayaOne offers a Sandbox as a Service platform that reduces vendor complexity. The first Arkansas Lithium Innovation Summit was held last week in Little Rock. The event was a big success, attracting nearly 700 industry professionals, policy makers, and business leaders. The Venture Center wrapped up its inaugural Veteran-Owned Small Business Accelerator in partnership with the Small Business Administration. The program culminated with a live pitch event in front of a full audience of supporters.

Florida

Carewell, a Miami-based online retailer focused on providing family caregivers with tools and resources, raised $24.7M in Series B funding. AEXLAB announced the launch of its highly anticipated VAIL VR game on Meta Quest after a successful $5M raise. Commercetech platform smartBeemo raised $6M to support Latino online businesses. Finally, Global Ventures at Florida Atlantic University welcomed 4 new recruits to its second-stage incubator.

Georgia

In Douglas, Diamond Builders, a manufacturer prefabricated modular buildings, received an investment from LO3 Capital alongside Tamarix Equity Partners. The deal terms were not disclosed. Georgia Banking Company announced a new collaboration with the Advanced Technology Development Center, Georgia’s technology startup incubator. ATDC, a program of Georgia Tech’s Enterprise Innovation Institute, is one of the nation’s premier tech startup incubators. The collaboration is designed to provide financial and strategic support.

Mississippi

The Gulf Blue Navigator, a program of the University of Southern Mississippi Research Foundation, selected cohort 1 for its 4-month blue tech program. Click here to read about the participating startups.

North Carolina

Venture Connect in Raleigh is coming up soon: March 20-21st. With annual attendance over 1,200, this summit is the largest conference in the South for tech and biotech companies. Startups who have pitched on their stage have raised a cumulative $9B. Check out who is pitching this year. News out of Wilmington: OpiAID raised another $500K. The local AI startup improves opioid use disorder treatment with AI-enabled wearable technology. Also in Wilmington, Boreas Monitoring Solutions won the Big Launch Challenge and $10K from The Launch Place, an ESO and fund with office locations in Danville, Virginia, and the Research Triangle Park. Boreas has a patented weight-based remote monitoring system for monitoring “invaluable specimens” like sperm or embryos.

Tennessee

UnityAI, a Nashville-based healthtech startup, raised $4M in seed funding led by Max Ventures. The startup deploys advanced AI to improve hospital bed management, optimizing resource allocation and improving patient care. Congratulations to three TN companies that were among 50 projects to share $61M in funding awarded by the Department of Energy under the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. Kudos to Veracity Nuclear for its $200K SBIR award; Cinco Research Corp for its $250K SBIR award; and Cryomagnetics for bringing in a hefty $1.25M Phase II SBIR grant for its superconductor related research. Coming up, the Knoxville Entrepreneur Center will host the 2024 What's The Big Idea Pitch Competition on March 3rd. Register here.