Financial deals, mergers and acquisitions in the tech ecosystem are mentioned daily in the Atlanta Inno Beat newsletter, along with insights on how personnel moves may impact a startup’s future. Sign up for the Beat to get it each day in your inbox.
Check out the most important mergers, acquisitions and investments from Atlanta technology companies from August 2020. Did we miss a deal? Let me know at mhogan@americaninno.com.
Paya, an Atlanta-based fintech and payments firm, merged with FinTech Acquisition Corp. III in Philadelphia. According to the Atlanta Business Chronicle, the deal will make the company public and value it at $1.3B. The payments provider processes more than $30B in transactions for more than 100K customers annually. The company reportedly had an annual revenue of $205M this year, according to a filing with the SEC. The combined company will be headquartered in Atlanta, operate as Paya and will be listed on Nasdaq under the new symbol “PAYA.” The company will be run by Paya CEO Jeff Hack; CFO Glenn Renzulli; CRO Mark Engels, CIO Darrell Winfield; Chris Scappa, operations; Andrea Kando, product and marketing; and Ben Weiner, corporate development and strategic initiatives.
Atlanta-based marketing and email company Mailchimp launched a $1M Integration Fund for developers and startups. “The COVID-19 crisis has left small businesses, developers, and the startup community in a difficult place,” the company stated in a blog post. “We’re launching the Integration Fund to support developers during a time of economic uncertainty by investing in them to create tools that will help our small business customers be smarter and more effective with their marketing.” Mailchimp will accept applications from developers and startups who can create an integration with the Mailchimp platform that provides advanced features via Mailchimp’s Marketing API for free to users. Applications are open now through Sept. 1. Once selected, developers will be offered financial support upfront, and on an ongoing basis to help them perform the work.
Revionics, an Austin AI-based retail tech software startup, announced it was acquired by Aptos, an Atlanta-based retail tech company owned by Goldman Sachs Merchant Banking Division. Financial terms weren’t disclosed, and the deal is expected to close next month. The combined company would have 1K-plus retail brands globally.
IRONSCALES, an Atlanta and Tel Aviv-based email security firm, closed an $8M Series B extension round led by Jump Capital, a Chicago-based venture and growth capital firm. The new funding follows the company’s $15M Series B closed in 2019 by current IRONSCALES investor K1 Investment Management. The startup plans to use the funding to accelerate its growth strategy through market expansion along with ongoing research and development of its anti-phishing platform, according to a company spokesperson. “While we weren’t actively seeking capital, partnering with Jump was too good of an opportunity for us to pass up,” Eyal Benishti, IRONSCALES founder and CEO, said in a statement. “With this Series B extension, and with Jump and McNulty on our team, we will be able to accelerate our marketplace momentum through investments in both people and technology, helping reduce the risk from what has become a global email phishing epidemic.” Jump Capital Partner Saurabh Sharma will join the IRONSCALES board of directors as part of the funding. In addition to the funding announcement, the company announced it has hired Matthew McNulty as SVP of worldwide sales. McNulty previously working as SVP of international sales at Clearwater-based security awareness training and simulated phishing platform KnowBe4.
Atlanta-based Intercontinental Exchange Inc. struck a deal to purchase Ellie Mae, a Pleasanton, Calif.-based provider of cloud-based services for the mortgage finance industry, for $11B from PE firm Thoma Bravo. The company has about 1.7K employees and works in the B2B space, helping non-bank lenders, credit unions, investors and banks automate to a mortgage origination workflow. ICE, the owner of the New York Stock Exchange, officially announced the deal on Thursday.
EnrichHER, an Atlanta-based financial education, business financing and supportive community for women-led businesses, launched the All Rise Factory Program to fund more than 100 women-led businesses. Founder and CEO Roshawnna Novellus said she was concerned about how Black-owned and women-led businesses would be impacted when the pandemic began, according to a news release. After spending hours helping EnrichHER members navigate the PPP and apply for other external resources, she decided to come up with a way to help. “My solution is the All Rise Factory program, through which we plan to fund over 500+ companies by helping them access over $50M,” she said. With the new program, EnrichHER has options if you’re looking to invest in women-led businesses or you are a business looking for a grant or a loan. Find out more here.
PPRO, a London-based payments platform with U.S. headquarters in Atlanta, closed a $50M round led by Springs Capital with participation from existing investors Citi Ventures and HPE Growth. The company will use the funds to scale and accelerate strategic growth plans for its global platform. PPRO reports it has grown the size of its team by 25% since the beginning of 2020. No word on how the funding will impact the local office here in ATL.
An Atlanta-based startup committed to working on a hypersonic plane just received a $1.5M award from the U.S. Air Force. Hermeus announced it is working with the Presidential and Executive Airlift Directorate to help develop an aircraft that can fly at Mach 5 speed. If you didn't watch "Speed Racer" as a kid, that's five times the speed of sound. Now, that's what I call a moonshot idea.
American Express agreed to acquire Kabbage, one of Atlanta’s fastest growing fintech unicorns. The two companies report the acquisition will close later this year. Kabbage’s pre-existing loan portfolio is not included in the purchase agreement and financial terms were not disclosed. AmEx states the acquisition is a major move toward the company’s “goal of being an essential partner to small businesses through a broad range of payment, cash flow and financial management tools.” The loan lending platform’s team, products, data and IP for small businesses will be acquired by AmEx. Those products include flexible lines of credit, online bill payment, cash flow visualization tools, e-gift certificates and the company’s recently launched checking account for mom-and-pop shops, according to a news release. AmEx also plans to offer a broader set of cash flow management tools and working capital products. “For several years, American Express has been expanding beyond our industry-leading commercial card products to offer our business customers a growing set of payment and working capital solutions,” Anna Marrs, president of global commercial services at AmEx, said in a statement. “This acquisition accelerates our plans to offer U.S. small businesses an easy and efficient way to manage their payments and cash flow digitally in one place, which is more critical than ever in today’s environment.” With the addition of Kabbage’s technology, products and people, American Express plans to offer a broader set of cash flow management tools and working capital products to its millions of small business customers in the U.S.
PadSplit, an Atlanta-based affordable housing tech startup, has raised $10M in a Series A round. Core Innovation Capital led the round, followed by Alate Partners, Citi, Kapor Capital, Impact Engine and Cox Enterprises. The funding will primarily be used to bring PadSplit's affordable housing model to more people, cities and property owners. Founder and CEO Atticus LeBlanc said the goal is to help more people, especially at a time when millions are facing housing insecurity."I don't think anyone thought 2020 was going to be the roller coaster that it has been, but being mission driven has kept us motivated and moving forward during these challenging times," he said. "We know that when we succeed, we're able to generate transformational life impacts."LeBlanc said the company would be hiring as a result of the raise. "Over the next six to 12 months, we will be expanding opportunities for a number of roles, including product, sales and launch teams, operations, customer service and marketing," he said.PadSplit uses existing housing stock to convert single-family homes or apartments into shared housing for workers and retirees earning less than $35K a year. Room rates range from $109 a week and include furniture, utilities, WiFi, laundry, 24/7 access to telemedicine and credit reporting for all on-time payments, according to a news release. To date, the company has more than 1K units in the Atlanta area and will continue to grow locally. LeBlanc said the startup plans to expand to new markets, including Houston."We are focused on markets that have high areas of need and available inventory," he said. "Houston is a great example of a progressively minded city that is actively working to create affordable housing solutions. Part of our current technical focus though is to allow housing providers anywhere to be able to onboard listings independent of our boots on the ground, while we can still provide the services and partnerships necessary to support low-income workers."
iVision, an Atlanta-based managed services and tech consulting provider, has received an investment from CIVIC Partners, a Chicago-based equity firm. According to Term Sheet, the financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Two big names in ATL tech are taking a swing at a new entertainment venture: virtual golf clubs. David Cummings and Michael Williamson are launching Intown Golf Club at Two Buckhead Plaza, a project that includes celebrity investors, modernized amenities found at traditional country clubs and high-end golf simulators. The club, geared toward "prosperous millennials," will feature 10 Trackman virtual swing bays with large screens, 4K graphics and launch-monitor tech with high-speed cameras and radar.
Antios Therapeutics, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on the development of innovative therapies to treat and cure viral diseases, raised about $4.4M of a $5M round, according to a filing with the SEC. Medshape, an Atlanta-based medical device and technologies company, was awarded a $2.6M development grant from the Department of Defense.Medshape plans to use the grant to research and develop a dynamic compression fusion device using superelastic nickel titanium for diabetic foot limb salvage surgery. The funding will be used over the course of three years to reach research milestones, according to a news release. The company's patented NiTiNOL platform technology can design devices to adapt and respond to specific changes in the body that occur during the healing process.Though it's unclear what Antios Therapeutics will use the new funding for (Atlanta Inno reached out to the company earlier this week), the raise comes more than two years after the company raised a significant $25M Series A round led by Lumira Ventures and Domain Associates. The funds raised in 2018 were to develop ATI-2173, an oral drug for treating patients infected with Hepatitis B and potentially Hepatitis D. The new round of $4.4M was raised from at least nine investors. Notably, Benjamin Rovinski with Lumira Ventures and Nicole Vitullo with Domain Associates were listed as directors on the Form D filing.
One of Atlanta's oldest Historically Black Colleges and Universities has received funding to drive STEM innovation at the school. Morehouse College was awarded a $9M grant from the National Science Foundation. The school is now a founding partner of the HBCU Undergraduate Success Research Center, a program designed to "increase educational and employment opportunities for minorities interested in STEM subjects," according to a news release. The STEM-US center will study STEM initiatives at 50 HBCUs across the country, produce data and create a set of best practices to be used at other colleges and universities to increase the volume of minority STEM majors, according to a news release. Morehouse, which states it is the school with the most Black male graduates in STEM fields, will specifically examine how and why HBCUs are successful at supporting innovation and efforts in STEM subjects. The school will share part of the grant with Atlanta's Spelman College and Virginia State University." Investing in the institutional capacity of HBCUs and developing diverse STEM talent is part of NSF's longstanding commitment to broaden participation of groups traditionally underrepresented in STEM," NSF Program Director Claudia Rankins, who manages the HBCU program, said in a statement. "The knowledge generated by this center will detail what practices make HBCUs successful in educating Black students in STEM, and the center will place HBCUs at the forefront of STEM education reform."
Qlik, a business intelligence agency based in King of Prussia, Penn., acquired the IP and assets of Knarr Analytics, an Atlanta-based analytics software startup that focuses on rapid collaborative analytics. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Knarr's technology helps analysts and developers in the business intelligence world manage the use of different datasets. Qlik said in a statement that Knarr's technology will enhance its analytics cloud platform and increase collaborations between users.
Artis Technologies, an Atlanta-based lending platform, closed a $1.5M seed round led by Fintech Ventures Fund and affiliates.The new funding brings Artis' total raised to $3M in debt and equity. Angel Oak Capital Advisors is a previous investor in the company.“ A core area of our Fund’s focus has been around innovation in consumer finance," Lucas Timberlake, partner at FVF, said in a statement. "Artis is taking a unique approach toward reducing the pain points that various stakeholders experience during the point-of-need financing lifecycle. We are excited to support Artis’ seasoned management team in this next phase of the company’s growth." Since launching in March, the company has launched two products -- a platform that connects businesses to a network of banks, credit unions and other entities in the lending space and a product that enables financial institutions to offer downstream credit through their existing customers.“ Launching during the pandemic proved to be a challenge, but also allowed for time to focus on our technology and broader product strategy – proving to our team, current and prospective investors, and clients exactly what we’re capable of," Barclay Keith, CEO of Artis, said in a statement.
Heavy-weight payments tech PayPal has donated $10M in grants to 963 Black-owned businesses across the country -- two of which are based in Georgia. The grants are part of a bigger commitment from the company to help address economic inequalities. The two Georgia recipients are Cam Kirk Studios, a creative space based in Atlanta for photographers to learn and document Black culture while giving back to the local community, and Francar's Wings, a buffalo wing restaurant in Macon.
Alpharetta-based ModifyHealth has closed a $2M Series A funding round led by Nashville Capital Network. The company provides meal delivery, dietitian support and digital health services for patients suffering from chronic gastrointestinal diseases like irritable bowel syndrome and celiac disease. It was founded in 2018.The partnership will support continued product and service growth and expansion of nationwide operations. For diseases like IBS, inflammatory bowel disease and small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) where physicians recommend dietary modification as part of treatment, ModifyHealth offers patients delivery of prepared organic, non-GMO meals and consultation with dieticians. “We’re excited to partner with Nashville Capital Network and look forward to putting this new capital to work to support more customers,” G.B. Pratt, founder and CEO of ModifyHealth, said in the announcement. “There’s a growing recognition of the vital role ‘food as medicine’ will play in the management of chronic health conditions and we’re just scratching the surface on the impact we can make. NCN is a great cultural fit and their strategic support and healthcare expertise will help us execute our vision even more rapidly and broadly.” Nashville Capital Network Managing Partner Chase Perry will join ModifyHealth's board of directors.
Cryoport, a Brentwood-Tenn.-based temperature-controlled logistics firm backed by Blackstone, acquired MVE Biological Solutions, a Ball Ground-based vacuum-insulated products manufacturer, for $320M. MVE is a provider of cryogenic storage and transportation products for the life sciences industry. The company employs more than 226 people across three facilities in Georgia, Minnesota and Cheng-du, China.
MyPorter, an Atlanta-based moving and storage startup, has received an undisclosed round led by Florida Funders. The company states its goal is to surpass the goal of $3M raised in the next 90 days.According to co-founder John Foshee, the funding will primarily be used for expanding operations in Tampa within the next six months, where Florida Funders, a venture capital fund and angel investor network, is located. The decision to expand in Tampa was thanks to the city's rapid growth and Florida Funders' connections in the community. The startup and fund met at Venture Atlanta last year, one of the largest venture capital conferences in the Southeast. In addition to the funding, Chad Harrod, Florida Funders member and CEO of Harrod Properties, Inc., will join MyPorter's board of directors.
