Posts Tagged ‘Cary’
Tuesday, August 10th, 2010
 WESTON, FL – ParinGenix, which is developing a modified form of heparin to reduce inflammation in patients following a heart attack, has nabbed $4.39 million of a $5 million equity funding, according to a regulatory filing.
Investors in the company, which disclosed the raise in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, include Investors Research Corp. Technologies, (RCT) of Tuson, AZ, Academy Venture Fund of Charlotte, NC, A.P. Kennedy Family Securities of Madisonville, LA, CHL Medical Partners, Stamford, CT, Domain Associates, Princeton, NJ, and Aurora Funds, NC.
It raised a $4 million A round in 2002 and a $20.4 million B round in 2006.
Previously KRCT Therapeutics Inc., ParinGenix has developed a form of heparin that significantly reduces damage to the heart following myocardial infarction. It’s lead drug, PGX-100, is also in clinical trials for other critical-care indications.
Tags: Aurora Funds, Cary, Charlotte, financing, Florida, NC, ParinGenix, Weston
Posted in Carolinas, Florida, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Thursday, August 5th, 2010
By Allan Maurer
 CARY, NC – StatSheet, a first-in-class sports media company delivering online sports data visualization and analysis, has secured its first round of venture capital funding, led by Valhalla Partners.
The company has already hired a developer team to expand its offerings and automate creation of new content. Thus far, StatSheet has been a one-man operation. “We’re up to nine people counting me,” says Robbie Allen, founder and CEO of StatSheet, and former Distinguished Engineer, IT at Cisco, who has done everything at the company up to now.
IDEA Fund Partners, and several other prominent investors also participated in the round. Valhalla General Partner Scott Frederick and Atlanta entrepreneur and former Turner Broadcasting executive Greg Foster have been named to the company’s board of directors.
“Financial backing from industry leaders like these will help us more quickly deliver the next generation online sports experience,” Allen says.
Team specific sites being developed
The company’s current platform at StatSheet.com, allows sports fans unique access to in-depth analysis and data on hundreds of teams and thousands of players across decades of sports events. Users can run queries on data, instantly build charts and graphs, and customize their view of relevant information.
In addition, the company’s Embed StatSheet service provides media companies and bloggers the ability to insert professional sports stats, content, visualizations, charts and interactive features that display countless derivatives of sports data.
This Fall, the company plans to roll out an extensive network of team-specific sites powered by a central automated publishing system. Sites will be automatically updated with relevant content such as game previews, injury updates and recaps.
Foster, a long-time advisor to the company said, “StatSheet’s application of technology and automation in this arena redefines the way that sports content is delivered. This is a real game changer.”
Coming: an “artificial journalist”
In the fall, the company plans to create an “artificial journalist” that takes college basketball data and “writes” a story that 90 percent of readers would be unable to tell from one written by a human journalist. After launching the project based on NCAA basketball, he plans to expand it to NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB games.
Allen explains that “70 percent of sports content is based on stats. We’re developing a technology that will go through the stats, do a ton of analysis and bake it into our technology so we can spit out stories quickly.” The automated story technology may have applications in other areas, Allen adds, but right now the company is focused on sports. “We’re in the middle of developing it,” says Allen.
He says StatSheet has identified 20 different types of sports stories it can automate. Many sports stories written by human journalists are actually rather formulistic in nature, he notes.
That’s just what journalists need, automated competition. We’re curious to see how the “artificial journalist” project works out, but we confess its one area of technology we don’t necessarily want to see expand into other areas – tech reporting, for instance. The project is slated to start this summer.
Allen tells us that StatSheet may look for a larger round down the road if nothing else, such as an acquisition, happens in the meantime. The company could be attractive to any number of buyers. ESPN, for instance, maintains one of the most complete, active and successful interactive sports networks online.
Right now, though, Allen says, “It’s hard to forecast what the next three months will look like with all the opportunities we’re going after.”
For TechJournal South’s profile of the company see: StatSheet helps sports buffs track all the numbers.
To contact TechJournal South Editor & Writer Allan Maurer: Allan at TechJournalSouth dot com.
Tags: artificial journalist, Cary, financing, Greg Foster, IDEA Fund, NC, Robbie Allen, Scott Frederick, sports stats and analysis, StatSheet, Valhalla
Posted in Carolinas, Internet/New Media, IT, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010
 By Allan Maurer
CARY, NC – Securus Inc., a company selling GPS-based products for safety and security applications, has nabbed an investment from Florida-based Naples Ventures in an undisclosed amount.
Securus has created a unique GPS-based technology platform, “GPS as a Service” to deliver, along with its market partners, fully featured and customized safety and security solutions designed specifically for each vertical market.
CEO and chair Chris Newton tells us that the company, which currently employs six fulltime and three partime people will be doing some hiring, primarily in sales and implementation after wrapping up some “Block and tackle work.”
The new verticals will include areas such as primary care, he says.
Securus has launched a product for the pet market in partnership with American Kennel Club Companion Animal Recovery (www.SpotLightgps.com) and says it will announce new products and partnerships for additional markets in the coming months. The Spotlight product lets pet owners know when an animal crosses a boundry area and helps them track it if it wanders off.
The same system can track a child or someone needing special care. “A parent can know when their child leaves the house, gets on a school bus, and arrives, ” explains Newton.
We reported on the animal recovery product previously. See: PAW GPS locator helps find pets. The company changed its name to Securus about a month and half ago to reflect its new broader direction, says Newton.
Naples Ventures is a boutique investment firm that invests in and buys companies, typically focusing on consumer oriented businesses. Its investments included Bill Me Later, which was acquired by eBay.
Naples Ventures’ investment model is to hold only four active investments in its portfolio at any given time. Since EBay’s acquisition of portfolio company Bill Me Later in 2008, Naples Ventures has been seeking its fourth active investment. Securus has filled this spot and Bob DiRomualdo has joined Securus’ Board of Directors.
Bob DiRomualdo, founder and CEO of Naples Ventures, said, “We believe that the use of specialized GPS services for safety and security applications will explode over the years. Securus has a winning technical and business strategy, has market traction in a number of verticals, and has an excellent team. We believe that the success of the company and the potential for growth is remarkable.”
DiRomualdo was the Chairman and CEO of Borders Group (NYSE: BGP).
The company’s investment round is still open, so it is unable to disclose the amount of the investment. We’ll keep an eye on the SEC filings and let you know the amount when it shows up.
To contact TechJournal South Editor and writer Allan Maurer: Allan at TechJournalSouth dot com.
Tags: Cary, financing, FL, Naples, Naples Ventures, NC, Securus
Posted in Carolinas, Internet/New Media, IT, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Friday, July 23rd, 2010
 NC jobless rate lowest in Durham/Chapel Hill region RESEARCH TRIANGLE, NC – The jobless rate in the Raleigh-Durham-Cary statistical area that comprises the Research Triangle in North Carolina added almost 13,000 jobs in June as the region’s unemployment rate fell by nearly a percentage point to 8.2 percent from June 2009 when it was 9.1 percent.
The figures are from the monthly Employment Security Commission Report.
The 8.2 percent jobless rate was actually up a bit from May when it was at 8 percent, but month to month comparisons are usually not as meaningful as year to year ones.
The Triangle has the lowest unemployment rate in the state, trailed by Asheville-Brevard at 8.4 percent, the Triad at 10.6 percent and the Charlotte area at 11.5 percent.
The Durham Chapel-Hill metropolitan area had the lowest unemployment rate in the state at 7.5 percent.
While we would not want to celebrate numbers that high, they do suggest a economic recovery is underway in the Triangle area at least. But we’re still a long way from the ultra low jobless rates of the late 1990s.
Contact Tech Journal South Editor and writer Allan Maurer: Allan at TechJournalSouth dot com.
Tags: Cary, Chapel Hill, Durham, jobless rate, NC, Q2 2010, Raleigh, Research Triangle
Posted in Carolinas, North Carolina, TechJobs | Comments Off
Monday, July 19th, 2010
 NC IDEA’s grants program is intended to be a catalyst for technological breakthroughs developed in North Carolina that have a significant potential to successfully transition into commercially viable high-‐growth enterprises.
The upcoming Fall grant opportunity for North Carolina based companies will open in late August 2010. Learn more about NC IDEA’s grant application process and criteria at www.ncidea.org.
The following five companies are NC IDEA’s most recent grant recipients for the Spring 2010 cycle:
BioShape Solutions – RTP, NC
BioShape is developing medical devices that permit simple and effective local delivery of therapeutic agents around surgical implants. The company’s initial products are focused on delivering antibiotics for the prevention and treatment of orthopaedic implant infections. The combined treatment of these implant-‐associated infections costs the U.S. healthcare system nearly $2 billion annually.
The Coaching Mark – Morrisville, NC
The Coaching Mark provides a Software-‐as-‐a-‐Service platform dedicated to helping youth thrive through athletics. TCM works with scholastic athletic programs, offering holistic team management tools to the coaches and Athletic Directors, and provides athletes and their families a wide range of tools, content and exclusive offers to foster their athletic and life skill development.
Cooperative Entertainment, Inc. – Raleigh, NC
Cooperative Entertainment is developing a technology, service and marketing platform based on the tracking and utilization of idle or spare CPU capacity during online computer and video game sessions. A free software API called JoosyCloud is being created for developers and publishers to incorporate into their games that aggregates spare CPU capacity within these games and leases them to corporate, academic and government customers.
Open Connect Corp. – Charlotte, NC
Open Connect Corp. develops and markets ezFoodOrder, a web-‐based application that streamlines the nation’s $175 billion foodservice distribution industry. By allowing foodservice distributor to easily compete for restaurant business, ezFoodOrder reduces food costs for restaurant operators. Because restaurant profit margins are thin (5 percent on average) and food costs are substantial (roughly 33 percent of revenue), the result is a boost in bottom-‐line profitability for restaurant customers.
Patagonia Health – Cary, NC
Patagonia Health’s easy to use Electronic Medical Records software designed for physician’s small practices.
Tags: 2010 startup grants, BioShape Solutions, Cary, Charlotte, Cooperative Entertainment, Morrisville, NC IDEA, Open Connect Corp., Patagoinia Health, Raleigh, RTP, The Coaching Mark
Posted in Carolinas, Internet/New Media, IT, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Friday, May 21st, 2010
By Allan Maurer
 CARY, NC – Biologics Inc., which recently bought back its founders shares for $800,000, has a winning combination of services that not only helps make sure cancer patients get the right care, it also saves on health care costs.
That’s appealing to health care insurance companies, employers, and healthcare pros alike.
Founded in 1994, the 75-employee company calls itself an “integrated oncology management company,” says CEO Stuart Frantz, who was formerly chair.
Frantz tells us the company’s three main business units interconnect and rely on each other.
Its oncology pharmacy is licensed in all 50 states and works with clinicians handling anti-cancer drugs and those providing some relief from side-effects such as vomiting and anemia. Fortunately, Frantz says, “Targeted biologics are getting better and while side effects (of anti-cancer drugs) still exist, with a lot of patients, they’re not as severe.”
Targeted drugs attack a tumor or cancer more directly, sparing other rapidly dividing cells such as hair follicles and those in the stomach that frequently cause hair loss and nausea.
The company’s oncology management services works with insurance companies and employers to manage cancer benefit programs, using evidence-based guidelines to help cancer patients manage treatment between doctor visits.
It works with patients to make sure their side effects are not more severe than anticipated, provide feedback between doctor and patient and do claims reviews.
The company provides monthly reports to employers and payers to update them on how the program is working.
Third, the company has developed expertise in handling the drug logistics in oncology clinical trials. Drug makers and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration often require a third party to handle the logistics of providing properly handled drugs used in clinical trials.
“They require a group with climate, humidity and document controls,” explains Frantz.
The company also works with biopharmaceutical companies on the closed distribution or launch of oncology drug launches. Many oncology drugs are both expensive and highly toxic. “They require a lot of patient touching,” says Frantz. “You have to follow back through to make sure it’s being taken properly.”
Frantz says Biologics is growing rapidly and has three job openings on its web site now.
“We’ve grown rapidly over the last three years and our objective is to continue that growth,” he says.
Tags: Biologics, Biotech, Cary, NC, oncology, oncology management, Pharma
Posted in Carolinas, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Wednesday, May 19th, 2010
 CARY, NC – Biologics Inc., a Cary-based cancer management company, has raised just over $800,000 in equity to redeem shares from the company’s founders.
Founded in 1994, the company provides a patient-focused platform for managing the financial, emotional and physical aspects of cancer treatment.
It operates four divisions, Oncology Pharmacy, Oncology Clinical Trial Services, Oncology Management Services for Payors and oncology Biopharmaceutical Solutions.
The company disclosed the funding in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Tags: Biologics, cancer management, Cary, financing, NC
Posted in Carolinas, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Friday, May 14th, 2010
By Allan Maurer
 Rik Vandevenne RALEIGH, NC – River Cities Capital Funds has had a string of successful exits among its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) portfolio companies recently and may soon have another—Cary, NC-based SciQuest, which is lined up to launch an initial public offering of stock.
Raleigh-based River Cities Principal Rik Vandevenne tells us that the firm invested in eight SaaS companies, “primarily in the 2002-2007 timeframe before people really understood the power of the SaaS model.”
SPS Commerce, a St. Paul, Minnesota-based SaaS supply-chain software company, launched a successful IPO April 22 and became the only one of a busy day to trade above its $12 IPO price, opening at $14 on the Nasdaq exchange.
SPS Commerce marks the third successful SaaS portfolio exit for River Cities in the recent past. In 2007 California-based EVault was sold to Seagate for $185 million as the foundation of their managed data protection services offering, i365. In 2009 McAfee acquired Denver-based MX Logic for $170 million to add hosted email filtering to its “Security as a Service” solution.
Vandevenne points out that such success stories are important because the venture industry is shrinking and funds will have to show good returns to keep investing in high growth companies. He adds, “We think there is an appetite in the public markets for high growth tech companies.”
Actively looking for deals
River Cities, which also has an office in Cinncinnati, Ohio, has been investing in Midwest and Southeast startups for 25 years and has had a Raleigh office for ten, Vandevenne says. “We’re actively investing and looking to make investments,” he adds.
Vandevenne joined Ed McCarthy at the Raleigh office in 2004
“We are investing out of our fourth fund, $120 million, that we raised in 2008. We primarily invest in the Midwest and Southeast which we believe are underserved venture territories and look to partner with visionary entrepreneurs to grow market leading companies.”
Vandevenne says that means “You may have to turn over more stones to find the gems, but not all the gold is in California.”
“We invest in healthcare and information technology companies that are beyond the concept stage and have meaningful revenues and customers that validate the model.
Prepared for follow-on investments
“In healthcare we invest in medical devices, healthcare Services and healthcare IT.” He says that in medical device companies, River Cities looks for those useful to “the average doctor, not just the super specialized surgeon with magic hands,” and where there is a clear path to reimbursement and the money it invests will go primarily to sales and marketing.
“On the information technology side we look for SaaS, Cloud, enterprise software and technology enabled business services.”
Vandevenne says the firm typically invests from $3 million to $6 million initially, but “always reserve significant capital for further investment as things often take longer than one expects.”
He says River Cities is looking for visionary entrepreneurs with a proven model that has revenue of about $2 million annually.
Portfolio companies hiring
We hope some lawmakers in DC are reading this. As more evidence that startup firms and the venture industry are the real job creation engines in the United States, Vandevenne says there are 55 portfolio company jobs listed on River Cities Web site and “That’s only a fraction of the jobs they have open.”
That’s in line with our earlier story noting that many portfolio companies of other regional venture firms also have numerous job openings.
In addition to SciQuest–which Vandevenne could not discuss since it is lined up for an IPO–the firm’s Southeast portfolio companies include Prenova, Afterbot, and Prosero, and EndoChoice, in Atlanta, Privaris, Charlottesville, VA, High Speed Access in Louisville, KY, and Convey Systems in Charlotte.
Tags: Cary, Cincinnati, Ed McCarthy, Evault, IPOs, MX Logic, NC, Raleigh, Rik Vandevenne, River Cities Capital Funds, SaaS, SciQuest, SPS Commerce
Posted in Carolinas, Georgia, IPOs, IT, Money, North Carolina | Comments Off
Tuesday, May 11th, 2010
 CARY, NC – Intuit (Nasdaq:INTU), which sells Quicken, is buying Cary-based Medfusion for $91 million in cash. Medfusion, which uses Intuit software, helps healthcare providers communicate with their patients though online portals and other means.
Medfusion CEO and founder Stephen Malik will become a senior vice president and general manager at Intuit following the acquisition.
Medfusion’s headquarters will stay in Cary.
Intuit CEO Brad Smith said, “This transaction expands our software-as-a-service offerings with a solution currently used by more than 30,000 healthcare providers, the vast majority of whom are essentially small businesses.”
“The combination of Medfusion’s industry-leading patient-provider communication solutions and Intuit’s expertise in creating innovative solutions that improve the financial lives of small businesses and consumers, will help us create new solutions that make the clinical, administrative and financial side of healthcare easier for everyone,” he said.
Intuit notes that doctors who combine Medfusion’s tech with electronic medical records can qualify for a $44,000 government incentive.
Tags: acquisiitons, Cary, Healthcare, Internet, Intuit, NC, Stephen Malik
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off
Friday, March 26th, 2010
 CARY, NC – In a turnaround story likely to inspire business school case studies, SciQuest Inc., a company selling procurement software, has filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to raise up to $75 million in an initial public offering of stock. It plans to list on the NYSE under the symbol SQI, but did not disclose the number of shares it plans to sell.
Founded in 1995 by four entrepreneurs, SciQuest raised four rounds of venture capital and went public before in 2000.
However, the company ran into difficulties establishing its online exchange for laboratory supplies and finally brought in CEO Steve Wiehe in 2001, who began engineering a turnaround.
In 2004, private investors (California’s Trinity Ventures, Durham, NC-based Intersouth Partners and River Cities invested the funds to take it out of the public arena) acquired the company for $25.25 million and removed it voluntarily from the NASDAQ exchange.
The company said it plans to use about $35.5 million of its net proceeds to redeem all of its outstanding shares of preferred stock.
Wiehe and his team refocused SciQuest as one of the first to sell its product on a Software as a Service Model (SaaS). In 2006, as a private company, SciQuest posted its first profits. Wiehe participated in TechJournal South’s first Internet Summit (the next is coming up in Raleigh in November: www.internetsummit.com)
For the year ending in December 2009, SciQuest reported net income of $2.63 million from revenues of $36.8 million.
For the history of the company, see these previous stories on TechJournal South:
SciQuest: A turnaround story
Going private: SciQuest’s turnaround, part 2
Switching to software as a service saved SciQuest
Tags: Cary, IPOs, NC, SaaS, SciQuest
Posted in Carolinas, Internet/New Media, IT, North Carolina | 2 Comments »
Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010
 Spotlight GPS animal locator CARY, NC -Have you ever had to chase a lost dog? It can be both frustrating and worrisome. Everyone involved with Cary-based Positioning Animals Worldwide (PAW) has had to hunt for a lost dog, CEO and Chairman Chris Newton tells us.
Newton says that a group of entrepreneurs noted that GPS was becoming part of everyone’s lives. “We all had dogs and started telling some lost dog stories,” he said. “Then we did research, looked at the numbers and saw a real need out there.”
The company developed and sells the Spotlight GPS tracking device, a $249.99 device that requires a monthly service charge, but will help you find lost pets more easily than ever before.
The locator includes a lifetime enrollment with the American Kennel Club’s recovery unit.
Its features include a bright LED spotlight that a user can activate by texting it. A GeoFence feature alerts the owner if the animal strays from a designated geographical area.
During a hunt for a lost animal, users get text messages giving them turn by turn directions to help find it.
“The device had already saved dogs lives,” says Newton.
The company recently released a free iPhone app that allows users to track an animal in real time. “Your phone has GPS and so does the dog, so you always know where you are in relative to the dog” using the app, Newton says.
Newton tells us the seven employee company is funded by private angel investors and is looking for additional funding from a mix of individual investors and angel funds.
We think the company has good reason to expect success. “One of three dogs go missing at one point or another and Americans spend more money on catfood than on baby food,” Newton says. –By Allan Maurer
www.spotlightgps.com
To reach TechJournal South Editor Allan Maure email: allan at TechJournalSouth dot com.
Tags: Cary, NC, PAW, pet locator, Spotlight GPS locator, Startups
Posted in Carolinas, Company Profile, Internet/New Media, IT, North Carolina, Telecommunications | Comments Off
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