They've Sold Five LA Tech Companies and Just Raised $36 Million. Meet the Founders Behind Openpath.

Sam Blake

Sam primarily covers entertainment and media for dot.LA. Previously he was Marjorie Deane Fellow at The Economist, where he wrote for the business and finance sections of the print edition. He has also worked at the XPRIZE Foundation, U.S. Government Accountability Office, KCRW, and MLB Advanced Media (now Disney Streaming Services). He holds an MBA from UCLA Anderson, an MPP from UCLA Luskin and a BA in History from University of Michigan. Email him at samblake@dot.LA and find him on Twitter @hisamblake

They've Sold Five LA Tech Companies and Just Raised $36 Million. Meet the Founders Behind Openpath.

James Segil and Alex Kazerani are two of L.A.'s most successful tech entrepreneurs, but you've probably never heard of them because for the last 20 years they've been making bets on backend tech infrastructure. Most recently they scored a $36 million fundraise for their latest venture. And now as they look back at their careers, they've opened up their playbook to dot.LA.


Segil and Kazerani are, respectively, the president and chief executive officer of Openpath, a property-tech firm that recently announced a $36 million raise to accelerate its disruption of keycards and bring its touchless-entry technology to more doors, gates, elevators and lobby check-ins — a value proposition made all the more useful in the post-pandemic era. They co-founded Openpath in 2016 along with Chief Technology Officer Rob Peters, Chief Security Officer Samy Kamkar, and Chief Revenue Officer Phil Goldsmith.

Collectively, these five have sold five L.A.-based tech companies since 1998, employed thousands of Angelenos and watched the city's industry transform from Hollywood afterthought to spotlight stealer.

"When we started in tech in 1996," said Kazerani, who moved to L.A. after graduating from Tufts University the year prior, "we were excited if once a week there was a mention of something-dot-com." Then came Silicon Beach, followed by several behemoths like Facebook, Google and Apple setting up shop.

In the years since, Segil and Kazerani have been ahead of the curve on several gigantic tech trends. And they've attracted an inner circle of tech entrepreneurs that have helped build one big idea after another. By the time they started Openpath, the founders were able to call on people they trusted from their previous companies for the first 50 hires.

Segil envisions a future where he and his fellow executives are "going to be investors, advisors, and co-founders" for the next generation of L.A. doers and entrepreneurs. Successful tech startups, after all, often beget more successful tech startups, as employees learn on the frontlines before going on to start their own ventures. Segil likens this motley ecosystem to the "mafia" of tech stars that stemmed from PayPal and other Silicon Valley companies.

The Journey

When Kazerani moved to L.A. from Boston in 1996, back in the early days of the internet, he founded a web-hosting company, HostPro. This was long before cloud services like AWS and plug-and-play web design software like Squarespace made starting a website a simple, common undertaking. One of HostPro's web-hosting competitors, Geocities – also located in Southern California – would go on to be acquired by Yahoo! in 1999 for $3 billion, right around the peak of the dot-com bubble.

In 1998, Kazerani and his co-founder Lior Elazary capitalized on the world wide web exuberance and sold HostPro to Micron Electronics, a subsidiary of Micron Technologies, which specializes in semiconductors and today has a market cap above $50 billion. The two joined Micron, where they were tasked with building out its web-hosting division. One appealing target they found, conveniently located in L.A., was called Virtualis. Segil, a recent Harvard Business School graduate who had moved to L.A. when he was three, was its chief operating officer, working alongside CEO Chris Lyman.

But with the dot-com bubble expanding with no pop in sight, Micron wasn't the only buyer in town.

"They got a better offer from Allegiance Telecom (for $30M); they didn't sell to us," Kazerani recounted. But "as a result, James and I became friends."

By 2000, Segil left Allegiance, and Kazerani and Elazary left Micron, along with one of their first HostPro hires, Phil Goldsmith, who'd been Kazerani's college roommate in Somerville. Having ridden the wave of internet fever to entrepreneurial prosperity, the four of them, along with two other founders, bootstrapped their next L.A. tech company,

KnowledgeBase capitalized on a trend of globalization. The company aimed to help businesses share knowledge with their outsourced call centers, so that, as Segil put it, "people in the Philippines could speak educatedly about the product in Cupertino."

Again their intuition proved prescient, as KnowledgeBase sold to Talisma in 2005 for an undisclosed amount. One key lesson the founders learned, however, was that for all the work it took to build a startup with a successful exit, the size of the market matters.

"We'd worked our asses off chasing a small market," Segil said. "There are only so many call centers in the world."

Even before that realization crystallized, the KnowledgeBase founders were tempted by other potential ventures.

"Alex has ideas every five minutes," Segil said.

One such was a voice over internet protocol (VoIP) company, for which they built a prototype before deciding that it'd be best to focus on one idea at a time. This was around the time of Skype's 2003 launch, and well before the emergence of WhatsApp and FaceTime, all of which use VoIP technology.

Sensing they were onto something, they pitched it to Lyman, who bought it along with Samy Kamkar and named it Fonality. Kamkar stuck around until 2010, and by the time Lyman left in 2011, Fonality was worth nine figures.

Kamkar is a colorful character who's developed a following of his own and has helped to bolster Openpath's reputation. In 2005, the former high-school dropout-turned-security-guru designed a worm that infected over one million Myspace users. Although the impact was benign – infected users' profiles displayed the phrase "but most of all, Samy is my hero", and they unknowingly sent Kamkar a friend request – the early social networking site had to temporarily shut down to address the issue.

Openpath Chief Security Officer Samy Kamkar

The Openpath chief security officer has written about security vulnerabilities in the Wall Street Journal and commands a significant following.

"If he tweets about us we get more traffic than from TechCrunch," Kazerani said.

In 2006, as Kamkar and Lyman kept building Fonality, for which they raised over $20 million, Kazerani, Segil, Goldsmith and Elazary began brainstorming their next idea. They worked out of the Fonality office, which had lent them a conference room and three cubicles.

"We like changing industries," said Kazerani, reflecting on how he and his team have decided what to pursue next. "We think it's an incredible learning opportunity and exciting endeavor. We like disrupting. And we're trying to be meaningful, if not own the entire category."

"(When you're ideating) you have to let the river flow, (and) go with it," Segil added. "But there's a moment as an entrepreneur when you have to stop the flow and make a decision."

Back in the Fonality offices, captivated by the early popularity of YouTube, which had recently launched in 2005, they stopped the flow at the hypothesis that the world of entertainment was moving towards internet-enabled, on-demand viewing.

"We bet the entire entertainment infrastructure would switch to IP (internet protocol), so we deployed data centers in 70 locations and 40 countries," Kazerani said. These data centers became the backbone of EdgeCast, which helped to manage data traffic scurrying around between content distributors and the users who wanted to watch at the click of a mouse. Elazary could only work part-time while he pursued a graduate degree, so he brought in Rob Peters, who'd completed a triple-major at CalTech when he was 16, and was eventually made EdgeCast CTO.

Validating their vision that internet video was the next big thing, EdgeCast would go on to carry over 5% of all internet traffic, with clients like Disney, Pinterest, Tumblr and Twitter.

"When we started we had little clients; Pinterest, Tumblr and Twitter were small. As they grew, we grew," Kazerani said. EdgeCast eventually expanded to 400 engineers and was acquired by Verizon in 2013 for $400 million.

It was while working at Verizon, following that acquisition, that Kazerani, Segil and Peters confronted the problem they would ultimately aim to solve with Openpath: they were laden with keycards.

"When we look at what we want to do next," Kazerani said, "we look at industries that require disruption and we look at a pain point that we have felt...That's how we started Openpath: we actually suffered through it."

Lessons Learned

Looking back, Segil and Kazerani believe founders must put skin in the game to earn their keep and build an environment of equality. It's not enough to simply be there from the beginning; the effort and investment must be sustained. They also say building teams with complementary skills is a big help.

"When you divide and conquer, you can each excel as opposed to compete (with each other)", said Kazerani.

They also counsel building a culture of trust in which people are willing to share and listen to each other's constructive criticism – and where people have good reason to know that it is coming to them in good faith. One-third of Openpath's office space is meant for people to hang out and do things together, they said, and long tables allow the team to eat lunch together like a family.

"They take the business seriously, but they don't take themselves too seriously," said Kieran Hannon, Openpath's chief marketing officer.

Despite their repeated entrepreneurial success, Kazerani says startups aren't easy.

"Don't start a company," he advises, "unless you can't sleep well because you have to do the idea, and you're scared that somebody else will do it, and you're up for the grind."

It helps, of course, to have a team to grind alongside you.

"I don't think I'd want to do it solo," reflected Segil. "One reason I've enjoyed it is doing it with people you really like. It makes life a lot more fun."

https://twitter.com/hisamblake
samblake@dot.la
$207M Later, Napster is Back and Ready for the Metaverse

🔦 Spotlight

Happy Friday, Los Angeles!

This week, we’re rewinding the clock and fast-forwarding into the future at the same time. Napster, yes, that Napster, just got acquired for $207 million byInfinite Reality, a metaverse and immersive tech company that’s aiming to bring the iconic music platform into the next generation.

For anyone who came of age in the early 2000s, Napster was either your musical awakening or the reason your dial-up connection crashed. Launched in 1999 by Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker, it was the face of peer-to-peer file sharing and a lightning rod in the music industry’s first wave of digital disruption. After its legal battles and shutdown in 2001, Napster bounced between owners like Roxio and Best Buy, before eventually merging with Rhapsody and evolving into a legitimate streaming service.

Now, Infinite Reality is giving Napster a fresh remix. The company says it plans to turn Napster into a social-first music platform that emphasizes artist-fan interaction over passive listening. We’re talking virtual 3D concert experiences, listening parties, fan communities, and merch drops… essentially, a metaverse-native platform built for music superfans.

According to Infinite Reality CEO John Acunto, this aligns with the company’s bigger vision: moving the internet away from “a flat 2D clickable web” into “a 3D conversational one.” They’re betting that a brand like Napster, which already carries cultural weight, can thrive in a world where fans want deeper connections and creators want modern monetization tools.

It’s a bold move, but maybe a smart one. Nostalgia is a powerful asset, and in an era where legacy brands keep getting digital reboots, Napster has a chance to go from early disruptor to comeback story.

Will today’s listeners hit play? We’ll see. But as far as tech comebacks go, we’re here for this remix.

🤝 Venture Deals

LA Companies

  • Topanga, a Los Angeles-based company specializing in AI-driven waste reduction solutions for commercial kitchens, has raised an $8M Series A funding round led by Blue Bear Capital, with participation from Struck Capital, Amasia, and Wonder Ventures. This investment brings Topanga's total funding to $12.2M. The company plans to use the proceeds to expand its food waste tracking platform into the senior living, health care, and hospitality sectors, accelerate the growth of its ReusePass system beyond universities into enterprise food service, and enhance integration with major food-service platforms like Grubhub and Jamix. - learn more
  • Flight Science, an aviation tech startup focused on AI-powered flight optimization, raised $1.5M in pre-seed funding led by Outsiders Fund. The company helps airlines reduce fuel costs, emissions, and turbulence impact, and will use the funds to grow its team and expand product rollout by summer 2025. - learn more
        LA Venture Funds
          • Second Sight Ventures participated in a $14.2M Series A1 funding round for Lucky Energy, an Austin, Texas-based energy drink company. Lucky Energy offers a line of zero-sugar, zero-calorie beverages in six flavors, formulated with ingredients like maca and beta-alanine. The company plans to use the funds to accelerate distribution, introduce new products, support strategic partnerships, and recruit in key business areas. - learn more
          • M13 led a $5.5M funding round for Chord Commerce, with participation from Act One Ventures and others. The New York-based company provides an AI-powered customer data platform (CDP) that helps commerce brands unify customer data, generate real-time insights, and automate marketing decisions. The funding will be used to further develop the platform and support brands in scaling their data-driven marketing efforts. - learn more
          • Upfront Ventures led a $4M Seed funding round for Arlo Health, a New York City-based AI-powered health insurance underwriter focused on small and mid-sized businesses. Arlo offers level-funded health plans designed to improve preventive care and cost transparency through value-based care and AI-driven underwriting. The funds will be used to expand its broker network, grow its engineering and sales teams, and scale operations. - learn more
          • Bonfire Ventures co-led a $5M Seed funding round for VoiceOps, with participation from Village Global and others. Based in New York City, VoiceOps uses generative AI to analyze phone calls and surface insights that boost sales performance, ensure compliance, and optimize marketing. The funding will support product development, team expansion, and broader market adoption. - learn more
          • MANTIS Venture Capital participated in a $17.2M Seed funding round for EDGE Markets, a fintech company building banking tools tailored to the gaming industry. EDGE’s flagship product, EDGE Boost, offers a debit card and bank account specifically designed for betting, with features like spending limits, financial transparency, and cash-back rewards. The funds will be used to further develop the platform and expand its presence within the gaming market. - learn more

              LA Exits

              • SmartDepo, a leading provider of AI-powered deposition summaries for the legal industry, has been acquired by Rev, a prominent speech-to-text technology company. Founded in 2023 by civil rights attorney Isaac Manoff, SmartDepo delivers comprehensive deposition summaries featuring 100% accurate page-line citations, hyperlinked tables of contents, key admissions analyses, and deposition memos highlighting essential themes. This strategic acquisition combines Rev's highly accurate transcription services with SmartDepo's advanced summarization capabilities, aiming to enhance productivity for attorneys and court reporters by reducing manual review time and improving client outcomes. - learn more
              • Stem, a platform offering personalized distribution and digital strategy services for independent artists and labels, has been acquired by Concord, a leading independent music company. Stem will operate as a separate division within Concord Label Group, with CEO Milana Lewis and President Kristin Graziani continuing in their roles. This acquisition provides Stem with the capital and resources to invest in new technology, expand its suite of label services, and accelerate global growth, while maintaining its mission to empower independent artists with autonomy and support. - learn more

                          Download the dot.LA App

                          $100M in Wheels and Wings: Startups Changing How We Move

                          🔦 Spotlight

                          Happy Friday, LA —

                          LA’s mobility scene is shifting gears — fast.

                          We’ve got movement on the ground and in the skies this week.

                          Image Source: Upway

                          Let’s start on two wheels. Sequoia-backed startup Upway just launched its new 30,000 square-foot flagship facility in Redondo Beach, and it’s not your average bike shop. The UpCenter, as they’re calling it, is the largest e-bike refurbishment center in California — and it’s a big bet on LA becoming a leader in urban micromobility.

                          If you haven’t heard of Upway yet, you will soon. The company refurbishes e-bikes at scale, with $70 million in funding and operations in both the U.S. and Europe. Their mission? Make high-quality e-bikes more affordable and accessible, especially in cities where traffic is, well… legendary.

                          With California’s new e-bike rebate in effect and Angelenos increasingly looking for car-free ways to move around town, Upway’s timing couldn’t be better. Whether you’re commuting, cruising the Strand, or just sick of spending half your life on the 405, a refurbished ride might be the smoothest move you make all year.

                          Now — from bikes to drones.

                          Image Source: Neros

                          Neros, a young LA-based startup focused on American-made autonomous drones, just announced a $35 million Series A to ramp up manufacturing. In a market long dominated by overseas players, Neros is building drone tech domestically — and it’s not just for hobbyists. Their AI-powered drones are designed to be rugged, adaptable, and mission-ready, with applications across defense, public safety, and infrastructure.

                          The round was led by Vy Capital, with participation from Interlagos Capital, D3, Sequoia, and Keller Rinaudo Cliffton, the CEO of Zipline. Neros’ co-founder and CEO, Soren Monroe-Anderson, summed it up well: this is about “freedom through autonomy.”

                          Now, on to this week’s LA venture deals, fund announcements, and acquisitions…

                          🤝 Venture Deals

                          LA Companies

                          • BuildOps, a Los Angeles-based provider of a unified cloud-based platform for commercial contractors, has raised a $127M Series C funding round led by Meritech Capital Partners, with participation from B Capital, Fika Ventures and others. This investment elevates BuildOps to unicorn status with a valuation of $1 billion. The company plans to use the funds to enhance product capabilities, improve customer support, and scale operations to meet the growing demand from commercial contractors nationwide. - learn more
                          • Proteus Space, a Los Angeles-based company specializing in rapid custom satellite bus solutions, has raised an oversubscribed $6.1M Seed-2 funding round, led by Lavrock Ventures with participation from Crosscut Ventures and others. The funds will be used to accelerate the development and deployment of MERCURY™, Proteus’ automated computational engineering system, which aims to revolutionize custom satellite bus design by significantly reducing development time and costs. - learn more
                          • Occuspace, a Westlake Village, California-based company specializing in occupancy intelligence technology, has secured a $6M Series A funding round led by Lewis & Clark Ventures. The company plans to use the funds to accelerate its growth across higher education, corporate, and government facilities, aiming to make space utilization data the source of truth for understanding and managing the built environment. - learn more
                          • Qolab, a company specializing in quantum computing hardware, has secured Series A funding from Applied Ventures, the venture capital arm of Applied Materials. The investment will be used to advance the development and scalable manufacturing of superconducting qubits, a critical component for large-scale quantum computing. As part of the collaboration, Qolab and Applied Materials have also co-authored a technical roadmap outlining strategies to scale quantum computing from hundreds to millions of qubits. - learn more
                              LA Venture Funds
                                • Wasserman participated in a $56M funding round for Carbon Arc, a New York City-based AI data utility company. Carbon Arc specializes in transforming raw data from various industries into structured, standardized intelligence suitable for AI models and business applications. The funds will be used to accelerate the growth of Carbon Arc's Insights Exchange platform, enhancing its data utility services for businesses and the AI community. - learn more
                                • Trousdale Ventures participated in a $24M funding round for Coreshell, a San Leandro, California-based battery technology company. Coreshell specializes in developing low-cost, high-performance silicon anodes for lithium-ion batteries, aiming to enhance energy density and reduce costs. The funds will be used to scale production at their 4 MWh manufacturing facility and to plan a new 100 MWh facility, with the goal of delivering next-generation electric vehicle batteries to global automakers this year. - learn more
                                • Talino Venture Studios has participated in a $2.8M seed funding round for Higala, a Philippine-based instant payment system startup. Higala aims to enhance financial inclusion by connecting rural banks, thrift banks, commercial banks, and electronic money issuers through an open payments infrastructure, thereby lowering the cost of real-time payments and reducing entry barriers. The funds will be used to expand Higala's services, including the launch of platform banking in the second quarter, enabling smaller financial institutions to offer digital payment services. - learn more
                                • Alexandria Venture Investments participated in a $150M Series B funding round for Latigo Biotherapeutics, a Thousand Oaks, California-based clinical-stage biotechnology company developing non-opioid pain treatments. The funds will support the advancement of Latigo's selective Nav1.8 inhibitors, currently in clinical development, and the expansion of its broader therapeutic pipeline. - learn more
                                • Thiel Capital led a $3.25M funding round for Pilgrim, a biotech startup focused on enhancing human performance and defending against biological threats. The funds will be used to advance its Voyager platform, which is developing cutting-edge biotechnology with potential applications ranging from creating ‘supersoldiers’ to mitigating emerging biothreats. - learn more
                                • Alt-Capital and WndrCo participated in an $18M seed funding round for Town, a startup specializing in small business tax solutions. Town offers an AI-powered platform that automates tasks such as document processing and data collection, providing each client with a dedicated tax advisor. The funds will be used to scale Town's services across the U.S. and expand their team. - learn more

                                  LA Exits

                                    • Dieta Health, a Los Angeles-based company known for its AI-powered stool imaging technology, has been acquired by Cylinder. Dieta’s clinically validated app, shown to outperform traditional patient-reported outcomes, will be integrated into Cylinder’s platform to improve digestive health diagnostics and enable earlier, more personalized treatment. As part of the deal, Dieta’s founder and key team members will join Cylinder to support ongoing development and clinical research. - learn more

                                            Download the dot.LA App

                                            PledgeLA’s Next Chapter Starts Now with Noramay Cadena

                                            🔦 Spotlight

                                            Happy Friday, Los Angeles! As we wrap up another busy week in LA’s tech scene, there’s big news on the leadership front. PledgeLA has a new chair, and it’s someone who knows what it takes to break barriers and build lasting impact. Noramay Cadena, a San Fernando High grad turned triple-degree MIT engineer, has spent her career defying expectations. She started in aerospace engineering, leading operations before pivoting to venture capital, where she’s invested in 90+ companies across industries. She co-founded Latinas in STEM in 2013 and later launched MiLA Capital, a seed-stage VC firm investing in hardware and manufacturing innovations. As Managing Partner of Supply Change Capital, she has focused on technology transforming the food system, raising a $40M fund and deploying over $20M into 23 companies, including eight in California. Stepping into her new role as chair of PledgeLA, she’s setting her sights on an even bigger challenge: making LA’s tech and VC ecosystem more inclusive, accessible, and globally competitive.

                                            Noramay Cadena (left, with her son) incoming chair of PledgeLA, receives a Catalyst Award for Emerging Manager in December. (With Qiana Patterson, PledgeLA Chair 2020-22 and Managing Partner of NAYAH)

                                            She follows in the footsteps of Anna Barber of M13, whose leadership transformed PledgeLA into a driving force for change, launching the VC Fellowship to elevate diverse investors and spearheading the GP + LP Connections Series, which facilitated over 80 investor meetings last year. She also played a key role in the Venture Capital Data Report with UCLA Luskin and introduced the PledgeLA Catalyst Awards, honoring leaders driving capital access and innovation.

                                            Now as Chair Emerita, Barber will continue supporting PledgeLA as it enters its next phase under Cadena’s leadership.

                                            Cadena recognizes the strength of the foundation she’s inheriting. “Anna has been instrumental in making PledgeLA a force for inclusion in LA tech and venture. I’m honored to build on that work as we take the next big leap forward,” she said. “We’re at a critical moment for LA tech. We’ve built momentum, but now is the time to turn that into real, lasting change. I’m focused on forging new partnerships, increasing capital access, and ensuring that LA’s innovation economy works for everyone—not just the few.”

                                            Her first priorities? Expanding PledgeLA’s VC Fellowship to create more pathways into venture, strengthening connections between emerging fund managers and investors, and doubling down on community-driven initiatives. Earlier this year, PledgeLA members, including Wonder Ventures, raised $1.1M for wildfire relief efforts—a testament to the power of LA’s tech community when it mobilizes.

                                            With Cadena at the helm, PledgeLA isn’t just continuing its mission—it’s accelerating it. Thanks to Barber’s legacy and Cadena’s vision, the future of LA tech is poised for even greater impact. For more details on the transition and what’s ahead, read the official announcement here.

                                            And speaking of momentum, if you’re heading out this weekend, be sure to check for road closures—the LA Marathon is set to take over the streets this Sunday! Whether you’re running, cheering, or just navigating around town, it’s another reminder that LA is always on the move.

                                            Image Source: The McCourt Foundation


                                            🤝 Venture Deals

                                            LA Companies

                                            • Scrunch AI, a Los Angeles-based platform that helps businesses optimize their presence in AI-driven search results, has raised a $4M Seed funding round led by Mayfield. The company plans to use the funds to accelerate product development and expand its market reach, aiming to ensure brands remain visible and competitive as AI search becomes more prevalent. - learn more
                                            • Wolf Games, a Los Angeles-based generative gaming startup, has secured $4M in seed funding. The investment round includes prominent figures such as television producer Dick Wolf, music industry pioneer Jimmy Iovine, and Paul Wachter, Founder and CEO of Main Street Advisors. Wolf Games specializes in creating generative cinematic games that adapt to individual player choices, offering immersive and personalized storytelling experiences. The company plans to use the funds to develop its inaugural game, "Public Eye," set to launch in Summer 2025. "Public Eye" is a crime procedural game where players assist in solving murder investigations, guided by an AI-powered assistant that tailors the experience to each user's play style. - learn more
                                            • Fixated, a digital entertainment platform, has secured $12.8M in funding, led by Eldridge Industries. Fixated specializes in transforming creator representation and monetization, providing infrastructure, strategy, and expertise to help digital creators scale their content and diversify revenue streams. The investment will be used to expand Fixated's influence across talent management, content creation, gaming, and digital entertainment, aiming to empower creators and set higher industry standards. - learn more
                                            • Liminal, a user-generated content (UGC) gaming startup, has secured $5.8M in seed funding. The investment round included BITKRAFT Ventures, Riot Games, and OTK Media Group, with participation from angel investors including Marc Merrill, co-founder of Riot Games. Liminal is developing a platform that enables players to create immersive role-playing game (RPG) adventures without coding knowledge, aiming to make storytelling through gaming more accessible and engaging. The funds will be used to advance the development of this platform, with plans to launch publicly playable content in the coming year. - learn more
                                            • Pragma, a Los Angeles-based backend game engine developer, has secured $12.75M in strategic funding, bringing its total raised to over $50M. The investment round included participation from Square Enix, Upfront Ventures, Greylock Partners, and Insight Partners. Pragma specializes in providing scalable backend solutions for live-service games, powering features like matchmaking, analytics, and monetization. The new funds will be used to enhance their suite of live-service tools, support strategic acquisitions, and strengthen partnerships within the gaming industry. - learn more
                                            • Tetrous, a Sherman Oaks-based biotech company focused on bone-to-tendon healing, raised $6.5M in an oversubscribed Series A round. The funds will be used to expand market reach, generate clinical data, and broaden surgical applications of its technology. - learn more
                                            • Uthana, a generative AI company specializing in 3D character animation, has raised a $4.3M funding round led by IA Ventures. The company plans to use the funds to expand operations and development efforts, aiming to revolutionize the animation and game development industry by enabling real-time, lifelike animations that adapt dynamically to gameplay, thereby enhancing immersion and realism. - learn more
                                            • LiquidTrust, a Los Angeles-based fintech company, has raised a $4M Seed funding round led by Anthemis Female Innovators Lab Fund, Resolute Ventures, and Motivate Ventures. The company specializes in secure payment solutions for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) and has introduced Micro Escrow Pay, an instant escrow payment solution designed to embed trust directly into payment flows. The funds will be used to expand operations and development efforts, aiming to protect SMBs from fraud and nonpayment risks. - learn more
                                              LA Venture Funds
                                                • B Capital participated in a $4.5M funding round for Bizongo, a Mumbai-based B2B e-commerce platform focused on raw material procurement and distribution, bringing the company's valuation to $980M. The funds will be used to scale operations threefold by December, expand product categories, and position Bizongo for profitability by the last quarter of FY26. - learn more
                                                • UP.Partners led a $4M Seed funding round for SaySo, a New York City-based retail technology company that provides an interactive shopping platform designed to turn excess inventory into profit-driven opportunities. SaySo plans to use the funds to expand its partnerships and bring its interactive clearance platform to a broader retail audience. - learn more
                                                • March Capital participated in a $200M Seed funding round for Lila Sciences, a company developing an AI platform combined with autonomous laboratories to accelerate scientific discovery across life, chemical, and materials sciences. The funds will be used to further develop Lila's AI platform, build the first AI-driven science factories, and scale operations to enhance scientific research capabilities. - learn more
                                                • Animal Capital led a $1.6M pre-seed funding round for Platter, a New York-based ecommerce technology startup. Platter specializes in helping Shopify brands create high-converting storefronts that maximize profit. The funds will be used to further consolidate disparate tools into a unified product suite, empowering Shopify brands to build more profitable storefronts. - learn more

                                                LA Exits

                                                  • Tastemade, a media company known for its food, travel, and home design content, has been acquired by food delivery startup Wonder for $90M. The acquisition aims to integrate Tastemade’s content with Wonder’s services, including takeout, delivery, and meal kits, to create a comprehensive "mealtime super app." The deal is also expected to enhance Wonder’s advertising business and offer seamless access to meals featured on Tastemade’s platforms. - learn more
                                                  • Jumpcut Media, a provider of AI-driven intellectual property management and audience analysis tools, has been acquired by Cinelytic, an AI-powered content intelligence platform. Jumpcut's platforms, such as ScriptSense and SocialSense, offer real-time insights into content development and market alignment, enhancing decision-making across the content lifecycle. This acquisition aims to integrate Jumpcut's capabilities into Cinelytic's services, optimizing decision-making in the entertainment industry. - learn more
                                                  • FatTail, a Calabasas, California-based advertising technology company specializing in direct advertising solutions, has been acquired by Chartbeat, a media operations software platform backed by Cuadrilla Capital. This acquisition aims to integrate FatTail's advertising revenue management capabilities with Chartbeat's content analytics services, providing media companies with a unified platform to enhance both audience engagement and revenue generation. - learn more
                                                  • Deep 6 AI, an AI-driven precision research platform specializing in accelerating patient recruitment for clinical trials, has been acquired by Tempus, a leader in AI-powered precision medicine. Deep 6 AI's platform analyzes both structured and unstructured electronic medical record (EMR) data to match patients with clinical trials, serving over 750 provider sites and encompassing more than 30 million patients. This acquisition aims to enhance Tempus' capabilities in clinical trial matching and real-world evidence generation, furthering its mission to advance precision medicine and patient care. - learn more

                                                        Download the dot.LA App

                                                        RELATEDEDITOR'S PICKS
                                                        Trending