Instead of knocking at the door of VC firms or individual investors, local startup Vyasa Analytics decided to raise funds in another way—by taking a long-term, low-interest loan.
Emerged from stealth mode in January, the deep learning software provider for life science and healthcare organizations announced on Tuesday it has received a $1.8 million loan from MassDevelopment’s Emerging Technology Fund.
The loan, which must be paid pack in six years, brings the company's total funding to $2.8 million, adding it up to an initial private investment of $500,000.
For Dr. Christopher Bouton, founder and CEO of Vyasa, there are many different ways to grow a business, including taking VC funding, but keeping the company private is the "really exciting way" and his "personal preference." Vyasa is an LLC, with Dr. Bouton as its sole founder and owner.
"My style, my preference, the way that I want to grow companies, my experiences having done it before, all are around growing private companies," Dr. Bouton, previously founder and CEO of Entagen, said. Another big data analytics company, Entagen was acquired by Thomson Reuters in 2013.
The money from MassDevelopment’s Emerging Technology Fund (which provided $73.1 million in loans since its creation in 2003) is earmarked for allowing companies to grow. As conditions for getting the loan, Vyasa needs to hire Massachusetts' talent and to build a local infrastructure.
The company said it will hire 18 additional employees in the next two years, bringing the total headcount to over 30 people. Data scientists, solutions architects, UX/UI designers and a range of professionals related to software development are the profiles the company is looking for.
"It's very possible we're going to hire the majority of these people now," Dr. Bouton pointed out.
Also, part of the money will be used to build out a local GPU-based compute infrastructure for Vyasa's deep learning algorithms. The company has chosen the Markley data center in Boston's Downtown Crossing to house its infrastructure, which will be used mainly for R&D purposes.
The company, which is based in Newburyport but is looking for office space in Boston, has two years to use the money from the loan and four years to pay it back, according to the conditions of the loan.
