Even our wildly entertaining managing editor has to take a break from the newsletter, so Kaitlyn, yours truly, will try my best to be as entertaining—if not more (for Pete's sake, I'm kidding)! You may recognize my name from a few story bylines, on social media or even from a few GrepBeat happy hours. Speaking of which, we are hosting our next one on Tuesday, April 9, from 5-7 p.m. at Bull McCabe's in Durham, in concert with Raleigh-Durham Startup Week. Your first drink will be courtesy of our great sponsor, Dualboot Partners. You can RSVP here.
Our latest Friday Nooner guest was Ivan Barajas Vargas, CEO and Co-Founder of Raleigh-based MuukTest, which automates software testing for B2B customers. We first profiled them in August 2019. Ivan was one of more than 120 startup founders who presented at last week's Venture Connect summit, so he, Pete and Joe had much to say about the conference.
Pick Up The Phone
In my previous experiences working in food service, whenever we were busy, ringing phones often went through one ear and out the other—I or someone else will get to it later. But according to the Co-Founders of Chapel Hill-based startup Virnika, restaurants lose customers and botch orders that way. Their AI-powered automatic phone-answering-and-ordering system can prevent that from happening, so that customers can order more efficiently and employees are freed up to carry out other tasks. Read our full story on Virnika here.
Virnika's approach to this pain point in restaurants is what led our sister company Primordial to add the startup as their second investment of 2024. See Primordial’s blog post on the deal here.
Sizes For All!
Personally, I normally don't fit into clothes sizes 6-and-under or over XL—yet whenever I'm shopping, those sizes seem to be the only ones available. That's why Durham-based Sizeo is using AI to help retailers and brands determine inventory needs by size based on stock-keeping units (SKUs) such as color and material, increasing profitability by selling more of the right sizes and less marking down of the leftovers. No more safety-pinning my too-big jeans, hurrah!
NC IDEAannounced yesterday the 20 semi-finalists of its 37th SEED grant cycle, which will award $50K SEED grants in May to early-stage startups looking to validate and advance their ideas. Six of the 20 hail from the Triangle, or seven if you count Graham as part of the Triangle—and we're feeling generous today, so congrats to OsRotrum Inc.!
Of the other six, we have previously profiled Champly, GameFlo Inc., Givefinity and GreySun Tech, while we're new to Raleigh's Academic Insight Lab and Morrisville-based Roomadillo. Though a little birdie (who's in charge of assigning story ideas) tells me we'll likely write more about them in the near future.
RIoT has announced that they have opened applications for their 18th cohort of the RIoT Accelerator Program (RAP), which will be held in-person in Cary. RAP is a 12-week program that supports tech startups by connecting them with companies and resources to advance their product, prepare for commercialization and develop a robust business model.
The application deadline is Sunday, April 14. You’ll find the full program details on RIoT's site.
A Jobvious Choice
When we first profiledJobvious in 2019 and then saw them again in CED's 2023 GRO Incubator, we knew we'd probably have them on our radar again sometime soon. Well, now they've been spotted on a national radar, as USA Today named the Cary-based startup as one of the "Top Companies to Watch in 2024."
Read more about how Jobvious is not only making an impact, but how they will also leave their mark in the upcoming year.
Triangle Leads
It's no secret that 2023 was a relatively slow year for venture capital activity, but it's still important to highlight some VC funder highs, especially in NC. According to 2023 data from PitchBook, the 50 largest VC fundings for NC companies totaled more than $1.4 billion. A healthy majority of those larger deals—64 percent—were for Triangle companies.
While two pharmatech companies led the list with $150M each, Raleigh-based Pryon came in third with $99.6M. I'm sure Pryon CEO and Founder Igor Jablokov will have much to say about this trend when he appears as a keynote speaker for Grep-a-palooza 3. Speaking of—as we reinforce below—the Very Early Bird rates will expire this Sunday, March 31, so grab your tickets today!
Read TBJ's coverage about the largest VC hauls in NC here.
Things Are Happening...
There's so much going on in our ecosystem nowadays that I'll spare you the transitions and get right to what's happening: 1) We will be attending the American Underground's Lunch & Learn Panel on "From Barriers To Breakthroughs: Women Founders & Funders" tomorrow, March 27, at 12pm. Our sister company Primordial's own Jenn Summe will be amongst the panelists, so sign up for a free spot (before they're gone!) to hear from her and other founders and VCs who understand the unique experience of female entrepreneurs.
2) The Launch Place has extended their deadline for their ninth IdeaFest Business Pitch Competition, which takes place on May 1. The competition will bring on 20 finalists to pitch their startup idea to a panel of judges and a live audience, the top three of which will be awarded $5K for first place, $3K for second and $2K for third. Learn more about the competition and apply before Monday, April 8 here.
3) When we attended Bull City Venture Partners' Founders First event last December, we got to hear from Shiv Narayanan, CEO of How To SaaS, a marketing strategy consulting firm that works with CEOs and revenue leaders. Using his experience in scaling tech-enabled businesses, Shiv will head a free entrepreneur-focused event hosted by Raleigh-based Scott Insurance and Hiddn, where attendees will get insightful discussions, networking opportunities and actionable tips from Narayanan himself. The event will take place on Wednesday, April 10, in Raleigh from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Seats are limited to 20 and will be selected by the organizers; request a spot here.
Very Early Bird
Our Very Early Bird rates for Grep-a-palooza 3 end this Sunday, March 31, so lock in the lowest prices now! The Very Early Bird rates are $99 for Startup Founders/Employees and $199 for Everyone Else. On April 1, we move to Early Bird rates of $149 for Startup Founders/Employees and $249 for Everyone Else. Then on May 1 through the event, General Admission prices are $199 for Startup Founders/Employees and $299 for Everyone Else. Here's the Eventbrite page.
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