Get details below on recent funding deals: In the past week, five Austin-area companies reported a combined total of $256 million in funding secured. Plus, a publicly traded company raised millions through a stock offering. These kinds of deals are a useful gauge of a company's evolution, and are sources of leads for real estate pros and other service providers.
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Cart.com Inc., an e-commerce software maker, announced Feb. 3 $240 million in additional venture and debt funding. Founded in 2020, it has raised around $380 million total as it builds out an e-commerce-as-a-service platform that helps businesses develop and scale online sales via online stores, digital marketing, fulfillment, payment services and analytics. Legacy Knight Capital Partners, a venture capital firm that combines multiple family offices, led the venture portion of the round, while contributors included funds held by banking giants such as Citi Ventures and Visa. J.P. Morgan and TriplePoint Capital provided the debt. Cart.com recently moved its headquarters to Austin from Houston.
Austin startup CoinLedger, which has a platform to help cryptocurrency holders with tax reporting, said Feb. 2 it has raised $6 million in new funding. Backers included CMT Digital, DRW Venture Capital, FinTech Collective, Volt Capital, Voyager Digital Ltd., Bakkt co-founder Adam White and The Block founder Mike Dudas. CoinLedger, founded in 2018 and led by co-founder and CEO David Kemmerer, plans to use the money to expand its team and product lineup. The startup's tax platform works with hundreds of exchanges and wallets to give users a broad look at their holdings and tax liabilities. The company operates legally as Coin Ledger Inc. and was previously known as CryptoTrader.Tax.
Austin-based Ferry Automotive Inc., which has created a platform for electric vehicle subscriptions, announced Feb. 3 that it has raised $4 million in seed funding. The funds came from AMYP Ventures, Venn Ventures and a pair of angel investors: Adam Forst and Lisa Besserman. Ferry's platform offers short-term leases on new electric vehicles — with no down payments and door-to-door delivery. The leases can run for six-, 12- and 24-month terms.
"The future of transportation is electromobility, and Ferry is all about the democratization of this future," said Kristian Russell, founder and CEO of Ferry, in a statement. "We are grateful to have the support from an accomplished group of investors whose strategic guidance will supercharge our mission to help get 50% of US drivers behind the wheel of an electric vehicle in the next 10 years."
A cybersecurity startup came out of stealth mode Jan. 30 and announced a $4 million seed funding round. Passage said its initial funding round was led by Austin's LiveOak Venture Partners. Other backers included Austin's Next Coast Ventures, Palo Alto-based Tau Ventures and San Francisco-based Secure Octane, along with several angel investors. The startup, led by co-founder and CEO Cole Hecht, has developed a biometric authentication protocol that doesn't require passwords. That allows users to log into web apps with Face ID, Touch ID, Windows Hello and other biometric programs. The startup also launched its public beta test Feb. 1.
“After decades of passwords and multifactor requirements, there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and we are excited to lead the way for developers wanting to implement better authentication for their users," Anna Pobletts, co-founder and chief technology officer of Passage, said in a statement.
Captain Experiences Inc., an Austin-based startup that runs a platform for booking fishing trips, said Feb. 1 it had raised $2 million in seed funding. The money came from investors including Looking Glass Capital, Andrew Chen of Silicon Valley-based A16Z (otherwise known as Andreessen Horowitz), Goodwater Capital, Not Boring Capital, Correlation Ventures, Capital Factory, Psion, WSGR and actor Oliver Hudson. Captain Experiences has booked trips with more than 750 guides, mainly along the Gulf Coast, co-founder and CEO Jonathan Newar said.
Public companies
Volcon Inc., which makes electric off-road recreational vehicles, said Feb. 1 it raised nearly $20 million through a stock offering. The company priced 6.6 million shares at $3 each, which gave it roughly $19.8 million, before commissions and other expenses. Additionally, underwriter Aegis Capital Corp. has a 45-day option buy up to 1 million more shares, which could give Volcon an additional $3 million.
Volcon (Nasdasq: VLCN) raised $17 million in its public market debut in October. The 52-week high for its share price was $17.96 on Nov. 18. Shares closed Feb. 4 at $2.71, giving it a market capitalization of roughly $47 million.
Last week, First Dollar, Skimmer and Bodhi were among the startups to gain capital. Get last week's wrap up here.
Get ABJ's latest list of local venture capital firms here, and see the list of angel investors here. A list of local startup incubators can be found here.
