Huge week for tech news: the release of Apple Watch reviews and preordering, along with the debut of the new MacBook and the Samsung Galaxy S6 phones, have dominated the headlines. So you may have missed that Boston tech had a pretty nice week, too. Along with a notable tie-up of local ed tech companies Valore and Boundless, four startups—Placester, Clypd, Pixability and FirstFuel—raised sizable rounds this week and a handful of other smaller deals were announced.
Leading the way on funding was FirstFuel, which closed a $23 million Series C round to expand its business of transforming the utilities industry. The company's software provides analytics on energy usage in commercial buildings—which let utilities identify potential energy savings without setting foot on site.
FirstFuel commercially launched its software in late 2012, and one of its products has found energy savings equivalent to taking “two coal-fired power plants offline,” the company said in the release. FirstFuel currently has 100 employees and expects to hire another 25 to 30 in 2015.
Here are the Boston tech funding deals we tracked this week—click the links for our further coverage:
| Company | Amount | Sector | Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1366 Technologies | $5 million | Technology for manufacturing solar wafers | Bedford |
| Clypd | $19.4 million | TV advertising technology | Somerville |
| FirstFuel Software | $23 million | Energy analytics software for utilities | Lexington |
| NetBlazr | $675,000 | Internet access for homes and businesses | Boston |
| Pavlok | Not disclosed | Wristband sets off a mild electrical shock for bad behavior | Boston |
| Pixability | $18 million | Software for marketing on YouTube | Boston |
| Placester | $15 million | Software for real estate agents | Boston |
| Yeloha | $3.5 million | Site for getting solar power services | Boston |
