Copy
View in browser

Sponsored by

While Pete is away cruising (and making us all very jealous), yours truly, Suzanne, GrepBeat staff writer, is taking over the newsletter this week. I will do my best to keep the newsletter as "wildly entertaining" as possible even though I do have big shoes to fill.

First up, you should know The Friday Nooner officially held its last episode last week before a summer hiatus. Friday's guest was Allstacks' Founder and CEO Hersh Tapadia, who told us all about his experience founding the Raleigh-based value stream intelligence platform (and what that means). We also had some interesting discussions on Amazon's recent news that Alexa will be able to mimic dead relatives' voices and if that means we are living in an episode of Black Mirror yet. 

 


Housing Shortage

Nearly everywhere I go, I hear whispers about the housing shortage and an overall home affordability crisis that is happening to the Triangle. So here, at GrepBeat, we were curious, just how much could this impact our growing tech startup community? After all, one of the Triangle's top qualities compared to other tech hubs is our relative low cost of living. The answer, after talking to a few experts, seems to be not very much. The Triangle is still primed to be an even stronger tech market, but there are several other larger implications for our community. Read our full rundown here.

 


Disrupting a New Industry

Clinical trials are one area in which errors can literally be a matter of life and death for the patients waiting for life-saving drugs to be approved. Scott Ogle, who is the former CEO of Raleigh-based fintech Sageworks, is now working to stop these errors from causing clinical research time delays with his new startup TruLab. TruLab made the Triangle Tweener List a few weeks ago. Ogle describes the way TruLab is disrupting the clinical research industry as similar to how Sageworks changed banking. Both displace paper in their respective industries and work to drive overall greater efficiency. Read the full story here.

 


A New SAS Acquisition

Cary-based SAS made headlines yesterday for its first acquisition since January 2021. SAS has purchased Honolulu-based company Kamakura Corporation. According to WRAL TechWire and TBJ, this acquisition is occurring alongside SAS's continued path to IPO-readiness, and the acquisition will allow greater innovation in SAS's financial services solutions portfolio. (Kamakura is a provider of specialized software and data for banks and insurance companies). Learn more about the deal from TBJ and WRAL TechWire.

 


Dreamin' in Color

Even though Salesforce is one of the most popular cloud-based customer relationship management platforms in the world, African Americans represent only around 5 percent of professionals in the Salesforce ecosystem. It's indicative of a larger problem of equity in the the tech sector, and to address this, Salesforce consultant Tiffany Spencer is bringing a tech conference to Raleigh targeting Black professionals this week. Dreamin' In Color is thus a two-day conference that aims to cover the ins and outs of Salesforce. The conference starts at the Marriott Crabtree Valley on June 30. Spencer said she specifically chose Raleigh to host the event because of its strong tech ecosystem. TechWire has more details here.

 


Investments Galore

All the way from Asheville, we have some news surrounding the future of Pine Gate Renewable's energy projects. The Asheville-HQed renewable energy developer has received a $500 million investment for the funding of their future solar and renewable energy projects. The capital comes from Generate Capital, and includes $200 million as an equity investment and $300 million as a long-term asset partnership for solar project financing. Read more on the funding from TechWire.

In other funding news, Avaya, which relocated to Durham in 2020, also announced it has brought in $600 million in "aggregate financing commitments." TechWire has the scoop.

 


Bright Future

Cary-based Brightly, formerly known as Dude Solutions, was once a subject of GrepBeat podcast Tech Culture Club with Chief People Officer Erikka Buracchio. Now Brightly makes it way back into the GrepBeat newsletter because it is set to be acquired by Siemens Smart Infrastructure, as the company announced yesterday.

Brightly will be sold for $1.575 billion plus an earnout, and Siemens aims to use the acquisition to accelerate growth in its digital building operations. Brightly was previously acquired by Clearlake Capital in 2019 and also brought on new CEO Kevin Kemmerer in 2020. TechWire has full details here, along with TBJ.
 



Jurassic Addition

Here at GrepBeat, we've had a front row seat to the moves Jurassic Capital made in closing its initial $20 million for its first growth-stage startup fund in January. Full disclosure: Jurassic's Joe Colopy (also a Bronto Co-Founder) is the GrepBeat Godfather, and Jurassic Capital and GrepBeat share an office space. With this said, we couldn't be happier to see WRAL TechWire spotlight Jurassic's most recent addition to the team, Chrissy Whitty.

Whitty comes with years of experience at JPMorgan Chase in Charlotte, where she supported high-growth commerce businesses and fintech in the Southeast. In the VC world, women associates are few and far in between, so this is a step in the right direction, especially as diverse teams are statistically found to perform better. Read the TechWire piece here.

 


Booming Triangle

The Triangle consistently makes the top of the list for places to work, but I don't often see a rundown by generation. According to a new analysis from LinkedIn, the Triangle is actually the best place for Baby Boomers to find a job in the country. Now, as one of the very first Gen Zs (one of the last of the 90s kids!), this does not exactly impact me, but it is interesting that even as many Boomers have left the workforce nationally, the Triangle may be attracting them here, especially in tech. Read TechWire for more.


 


Build Great Software

Founded by serial entrepreneurs, Dualboot is a business and software development company. Their clients include tech and non-tech founders as well as Fortune 500 companies, so they can start small or scale fast depending on what you need. Every client is assigned a U.S.-based Product Director with at least 10 years experience bringing products to market, and they can manage the entire development process. They focus on how the software fits into your company to drive revenue and build the business. At Dualboot, they don’t just write your software—they help you grow your business. Intrigued? Email them here.


 

Extra Bit

Applications for American Underground's Google for Black Founders Exchange Program close July 11, so be sure to get yours in! The program is looking for around 10 startups to participate in its week-long immersion program that targets high-growth startups in software, consumer product, IoT, data and more.
 

 

Because too much news is never enough.

 

Here's some helpful content from our partners.

You can find all our Partner Feeds here.

 

Here are some great jobs at Triangle startups.

To see all posted jobs, go to CronJobs. If you'd like your company to be listed, tell us at cronjobs@grepbeat.com and we'll do our best.

Pete is definitely not in a coffee shop this week, but that doesn't mean he's still not toting around the iconic GrepBeat mug as he sails the sea.

Any news we should know? Hit "reply" or send it to news@grepbeat.com.

Love what you see? Forward this to a friend.

Wait, a friend just forwarded this to you? Then subscribe!
Oh yeah, and follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.

This thing doesn’t write itself.
Credit (or blame) guest newsletter writer and staff writer Suzanne Blake.

It also doesn't pay for itself. See our sponsorship opportunities here, then
write us at sponsorships@grepbeat.com to become a sponsor!






This email was sent to <<Email address>>
why did I get this?    unsubscribe from this list    update subscription preferences
GrepBeat · 121 East Parrish Street · Durham, NC 27701 · USA