Joe Steilberg and Parker Klein, co-founders of Twos.
Twos
The Tampa Bay region eased into Q4, but despite economic concerns across the nation, it still made plenty of moves in October.
We've gathered up the new C-level hires, acquisitions, funding deals and other significant moves below.
HIRES
- The CEO of St. Pete-based iQor is stepping down. Gary Praznik will retire after 23 years with the managed service provider company, where he served as president and CEO since 2018.
Gary Praznik, CEO, iQor
Reginald D. Walton
- Tampa-based Blue.cloud has hired Bill Tennant as its first chief revenue officer. Tennant was the regional director of Silicon Valley-based ThoughtSpot.
- The Florida Center for Cybersecurity, housed at the University of South Florida, tapped Ernest Ferraresso as its new director. He will serve under executive director Frank McKenzie, who joined the organization in June.
Ernest “Ernie” Ferraresso, director of the Florida Center for Cybersecurity at the University of South Florida
University of South Florida
- ConnectWise appointed Raghu Ram Bongula as its new chief technology officer. He previously served as senior VP of engineering at Atlanta-based Global Payments.
ConnectWise HQ in Tampa
ConnectWise
- Tampa-based bioinformatics firm M2Gen is growing its lineup. The latest: Kyle Dunn, who will serve as the company's first chief revenue officer. Dunn previously spent 13 years at Fort Myers-based NeoGenomics Laboratories. He joins the company's chief people officer and chief data officer, who were hired at the start of the year.
ACQUISITIONS
- Clearwater-based cybersecurity company KnowBe4 will be bought by Austin-based Vista Equity Partners for a staggering $4.6 billion. It is among the largest corporate deals in the region's history. Get the story.
KnowBe4.
KnowBe4
- Cognitive Research Corp., a St. Pete-based health care company, had a majority stake in its company acquired by Cincinnati-based RC Capital. The undisclosed investment is for recapitalization and growth, according to the company. It will go toward expanding a global presence, accelerating business development efforts and expanding the scope of services.
- Tampa-based cybersecurity firm OPSWAT acquired German-based FileScan.IO for an undisclosed amount. FileScan.IO offers a malware analysis service, and its CEO, Jan Miller, will join OPSWAT as director of engineering of malware analysis solutions. This is the fourth acquisition for OPSWAT since 2019, which moved from San Francisco to Tampa that same year.
OPSWAT's San Francisco office
OPSWAT
MONEY
- Twos, the Tampa-based company that’s part social media, part note-taking app (and maybe best known for always throwing up the peace sign), has closed its first round of funding. The company closed a $1.4 million pre-seed round led by Tampa Bay Ventures, with additional participation from undisclosed investors. Get the full story here.
Joe Steilberg and Parker Klein, co-founders of Twos
Twos
- A Sarasota-based luxury jet club has closed a $100 million funding round just months after raising more than $9 million. AeroVanti Air Club gave us exclusive news of the funding, which was led by Louisiana-based Lafayette Aircraft Leasing. The money will be used toward expanding the company’s fleet and as an eventual springboard to going public in the next six months. The Business Journal’s got the scoop.
An AeroVanti plane
AeroVanti Air Club
- Naples-based Tamiami Angel Fund has been busy deploying capital from its fourth fund. The group of angel investors invested $1.3 million in Massachusetts-based Wyebot, which was part of a larger $6 million round. The fund also invested $2.3 million into Naples-based Catalyst OrthoScience, which closed a $12.3 million round earlier this month.
- Tampa-based Ballast Point Ventures led a $17 million Series B round for carevisio, a Virginia-based healthtech company. The company was previously CMT Solutions and offers a platform that performs authorization services for laboratories and doctors.
The Ballast Point Ventures team.
Ballast Point Ventures
MOVES
- Orlando-based Amazing Explorers Academy will soon grow its footprint to dozens of locations in multiple states. The school focuses on STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts and math) and is hitting its stride with 13 schools, five of which are local to the Tampa Bay region. The firm aims to have 20-plus schools in the next 12 months.
The new Amazing Explorers Academy, focused on STEM education for pre-schoolers, is coming to Lake Nona.
Amazing Explorers Academy
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