Airship, a D.C.-based maker of point-of-sale software for HVAC contractors, emerged from stealth mode Monday with the announcement of a $4 million pre-seed round led by Alexandria’s QED Investors.
The round also included participation from Denver climate-focused investment firm Silence VC, New York’s Four Acres Capital, San Francisco’s Twine Ventures and New York’s Lorimer Ventures.
Airship’s software platform integrates with existing field service management tools and gives contractors information on eligible customer rebates and incentive programs for particular energy-efficient products. The company says this information can produce larger sales for contractors, helping them make more money off individual service calls.
“HVAC contracting is a very seasonal business, and it fluctuates on how hot or cold it is. There was a big sales boom during Covid, and that has cooled off a bit,” CEO Craig Battin told me. “Call volume is down across the board. Our software is focused on doing a better job with every customer that calls.”
Battin said the company intends to use the funding to invest in building out its product and hiring additional engineers. Airship has users testing its software now, with a more official rollout expected in November and additional releases into the first quarter of 2025, Battin said.
Battin, a former executive at San Francisco fintech Earnest, founded Airship with Michael Sachse, the former CEO of energy startup Dandelion Energy and former chief marketing officer at Arlington clean-tech firm Opower. Opower founder Dan Yates is now CEO of Dandelion Energy and he recently moved its HQ to Arlington from New York.
Airship is a remote-first company, with its six employees scattered around the country. Battin is based in Montana. Sachse, who serves as executive chairman, is based in the D.C. area, which the company has declared its HQ.
The company also said Monday it has entered a partnership with Glendale, California’s ServiceTitan, a cloud-based software platform built to power trades businesses that has raised more than $1.5 billion in venture funding.
Led by co-founder and Managing Partner Nigel Morris — a Capital One Financial Corp. co-founder — QED is the largest venture capital firm in Greater Washington by number of deals closed in 2023, according to Washington Business Journal research. Since its inception in 2007, it has invested in more than 200 companies including more than two dozen that have gone on to become unicorns.
