Programming note: Sarah Glova has been laid low by a nasty cold, so she’ll be replaced as a guest co-host on tomorrow’s Friday Nooner by Clark Rinehart, the Executive Director of Innovate Raleigh. Clark will join Pete and Jackie—she’s keeping the seat warm for GrepBeat Godfather Joe Colopy, who is spending Spring Break in Akron (!)—in welcoming our guest, Sharat Nagaraj. Sharat is the CEO of Raleigh-based celito and a former subject of the Download Q&A.
We’re continuing the drumbeat to CED’s first in-person Venture Connect summit in three years—it’s one week from today, April 7—with two more features today on startups that will be presenting. First up is Raleigh-based Ivy Clinicians, a two-sided hiring marketplace for healthcare workers. CEO Leon Adelman, himself an emergency physician and the former medical director for two large rural emergency departments in North Carolina and Tennessee, saw firsthand that neither clinicians nor employers were happy with the current options. So he set out to build his own. Read our full story here.
And while you won’t see Sarah Glova on tomorrow’s Friday Nooner (see above), you can check out the Venture Connect preview that she wrote for TechWire. It includes some quotes from straight-talking former Friday Nooner guest Billy Marshall, the CEO of ServiceTrade, who will be speaking alongside Bull City Venture Partners’ Jason Caplain. We would bet a lot of money that Billy will harass Jason for not investing in ServiceTrade sooner (indeed he does so with Sarah). One final note: you can register for Venture Connect until this Friday, April 1, at 11:59pm ET.
Leggo My Syrup
Also on the Venture Connect stage will be Raleigh-based Induction Food Systems. The startup has harnessed the power of electromagnetic energy to heat fluids during manufacturing processes from the inside out, which is 20 times more efficient than current methods and thus means lower energy costs and less carbon sent into the atmosphere.
That might sound abstract, but here’s a real-world example of particular importance to me: making syrup. You see, I eat Eggos every Saturday morning, and anything that cuts the price of my Log Cabin syrup while also being more sustainable scratches me right where I itch. Man, I can’t wait for Saturday. Until then, I’m going to read our story again and dream of waffles.
Taste-y Software
We’re going hard on food-industry startups today by doubling down with Sample VU, a startup from a couple of Kenan-Flager MBA students that’s participating in the current cohort of the Launch Chapel Hill accelerator. It turns out that Covid has wreaked havoc on the development of new products in the food industry. It seems that it’s not so easy for a bunch of people to get together in a room and taste a bunch of samples for insta-feedback when, well, it’s hard to physically get a bunch of people together in a room. The rise of remote work even in the food industry increases the need for Sample VU’s planned project management software.
Read our full story here, even though it doesn’t mention Eggos or syrup.
Tweener Fund
With the first quarter (almost) in the books, Scot Wingo is taking stock of the Q1 portfolio of the Tweener Fund. You’ll likely recall that the Spiffy CEO launched the Tweener Fund in December as a rolling angel fund that’s essentially a spin-off from his Tweener List of Triangle startups that “aren’t too small or too big.” Scot makes all the investment decisions. And just a few months out of the gate, the Tweener Fund has already made a dozen investments. One of them is confidential due to active discussions for that startup’s next round, while the other 11 have all been profiled by GrepBeat: Belongly/Vertoos Health, Bristles, Peoplelogic.ai, Looma, MemberHub, Plum, Next Century Spirits, Truentity Health, Green Places, ProAxion and Klearly.
Scot also shares a number of interesting stats on the fund’s activities to date. You can see it on Twitter or LinkedIn.
Vroom Vroom
Understandably, there’s still a lot of buzz over Tuesday’s announcement that Vietnamese automaker VinFast is investing $4B plus in a manufacturing plant to make electric vehicles and batteries in Chatham County. The facilities are expected to directly employ as many as 7,500, plus create many more jobs as companies that supply VinFast move to or spring up in the Triangle and environs. VinFast will receive up to $1.25B in state and local tax incentives over the next few decades if it hits all its agreed-upon targets. The company wants to move fast, too, breaking ground ASAP and launching full production by the summer of 2024. You can find some TechWire coverage here and here, and TBJ coverage here and here.
This isn’t directly a tech story, but when a company pebble (rock?) this big falls in the Triangle, the ripples touch everything. Triangle Inno tried to gauge the impact on the entrepreneurial sector, with two potential benefits jumping out: 1) landing a car company elevates the reputation of the region as a whole and makes it a more attractive place to move, thus increasing the labor pool; 2) the direct and indirect improvement to job opportunities also helps entice out-of-town folks to accept job offers in the Triangle because they know that they (and their spouses/partners) will have more options if the original job doesn't work out.
Purrr-fect
We’re always curious about what Seguno—the Durham-based email marketing platform for merchants who sell on Shopify that was named as one of GrepBeat’s Startups To Watch for 2021—are up to. That’s because they’re innovators. (Not because we used to share an office and even now are only a few hundred yards apart.) So we were intrigued this morning when we saw that they have zigged where everyone else has zagged, launching a brand-new app for merchants to deploy pop-ups. I know what you’re thinking: everybody hates pop-ups. I hear you. But what if the pop-ups were of... kittens? Who can resist a kitten? It’s purrr-fect!
This is the most excited I’ve been about a Seguno initiative since last year around this time when they introduced a new breakfast cereal, SegunO’s. Alas that turned out to be an April Fools’ joke. But kitten-powered email popups are so awesome that they have to be real. Right?!
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.
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.
Guess where Pete is and (maybe) win a GrepBeat mug!
This week’s winner is Joey White, who was the only one who knew that I was at the Tin Cup Joe food truck (coffee truck?) in Chapel Hill. It’s shaping up to be quite a week for Joey—his wife Meghan’s birthday is today, his beloved Heels play Duke in the Final Four on Saturday, and he’s won the most coveted prize of all. (A GrepBeat mug, obvi.) Here’s more about Joey in his own words: “I’m currently an MBA student at UNC Kenan-Flagler business school and I’m very excited to be amongst the few who have won a mug. I will drink from this mug during the Final Four games… go Heels!”
Any news we should know? Hit "reply" or send it to news@grepbeat.com.
