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XSwoop's CEO Was Raised in the Limo Business. Now He's Trying to Reinvent it.
Rachel Uranga is dot.LA's Managing Editor, News. She is a former Mexico-based market correspondent at Reuters and has worked for several Southern California news outlets, including the Los Angeles Business Journal and the Los Angeles Daily News. She has covered everything from IPOs to immigration. Uranga is a graduate of the Columbia School of Journalism and California State University Northridge. A Los Angeles native, she lives with her husband, son and their felines.

Swoop is hoping to do for group transportation what Quickbooks did for accounting.
The platform service that tracks jobs for bus and limo drivers and their passengers just scored a $3.2 million seed round led by Signa Venture Partners, South Park Commons and other angel investors.
Started by chief executive Amir Ghorbani, Swoop aims to digitize business for the mom-and-pop companies that ferry people to corporate events, weddings and other group outings. Ride-sharing apps may be ubiquitous, but there remains a $40 billion U.S. market that's still largely analog in group transportation, according to the company.
"This whole business was run on pen and paper," said Ghorbani who grew up running around his parents' limousine dispatch center in the 1990s. He said his father, who immigrated from Iran, plastered the center's walls with pictures of the celebrity de jour — from Madonna to Tupac — who rode in their limos.
As a teenager, Ghorbani helped run his parents' transportation service, writing down job leads for them. After he graduated from college, he took a larger role and was struck by the persistent use of so-called "trip sheets" in the industry.
The info would tell drivers details of each ride, but in order to read it, drivers had to come into the dispatch center. Often pieces of information would get lost.
"Being around that, it became apparent — it was kind of an 'a-ha' moment — this industry needs a technical advancement from booking to dispatch."
Swoop co-founder and chief executive Amir Ghorbani at his parents' limo business.Courtesy of Swoop
The Los Angeles-based company will use the funds to build out its service, which is already being used by companies like Netflix, Nike and Airbnb.
Ghorbani had help from two longtime friends in creating Swoop: Co-founders Pete Evenson, a high school friend, and Ruben Schultz — whose parents came from the same region of Iran as Ghorbani's. Schultz, who runs operations, left Facebook to launch the company. Evenson focuses on sales.
Last year, the three-year-old service had 120,000 passengers with around 6,000 trips. Swoop caters both to providers and passengers.
"It's almost like what QuickBooks does for the accounting world we do for the transportation business," said Schultz.
The business management platform charges a flat fee for around $400 per month and works in conjunction with Swoop's consumer-facing business which matches transportation groups with companies, planners and other users looking from a group ride. Swoop takes a 15% to 20% commission for rides that it generates.
"It's a marketplace where we create more business for them," Schultz said. "Their vehicle utilization is at only 4.9%. So vehicles are standing around a lot of the time."
A Swoop driver inside his vehicle.
The application allows operators to track their vehicles, do payments through the service and communicate with customers. It also provides a single point of contact for corporate planners who regularly plan flights and other travel with online booking systems.
For Ghorbani, who as a child grew to know many operators, the business really provided him a way to help them. Many of the transportation owners were immigrants or working folks that didn't have the capital or tools to leverage technology in a way that would grow their business. Creating the company, he said, felt right.
"Being around (those operators) felt like family," he said. So this became — you could call it — a life calling."
Rachel Uranga is dot.LA's Managing Editor, News. She is a former Mexico-based market correspondent at Reuters and has worked for several Southern California news outlets, including the Los Angeles Business Journal and the Los Angeles Daily News. She has covered everything from IPOs to immigration. Uranga is a graduate of the Columbia School of Journalism and California State University Northridge. A Los Angeles native, she lives with her husband, son and their felines.
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This Week in ‘Raises’: Improvado Hauls $22M, Clearlake Launches $14B Fund
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
This week in “Raises”: A pair of Web3 platforms for gamers landed funding, as did a Manhattan Beach medical startup looking to bolster primary care via nurse practitioners. Meanwhile, a Santa Monica-based investment firm launched its seventh fund with more than $14 billion in dry powder.
Venture Capital
Improvado, a marketing data aggregation platform, raised $22 million in a Series A funding round led by Updata Partners.
Web3 gaming platform FreshCut raised $15 million in funding led by Galaxy Interactive, Animoca Brands and Republic Crypto.
Medical startup Greater Good Health raised $10 million in a funding round led by LRVHealth.
Joystick, a Web3 platform for gamers and creators, raised $8 million in seed funding.
Open source data protection company CipherMode Labs raised $6.7 million in seed funding led by Innovation Endeavors .
Mobile phone charging network ChargeFUZE raised $5 million in seed funding led by Beverly Pacific, TR Ventures, VA2, Jason Goldberg and Al Weiss.
Polygon, a startup aiming to better diagnose children with learning disabilities, raised $4.2 million in seed and pre-seed funding led by Spark Capital and Pear VC.
Pique, a virtual women's sexual health clinic, raised $4 million in a seed funding round led by Maveron.
Psudo, a sneaker startup that utilizes recycled water bottles and 3D sublimation printing to create its shoes, raised $3 million in a seed funding round led by SternAegis Ventures.
Funds
Santa Monica-based investment firm Clearlake Capital Group raised $14.1 billion for its seventh flagship fund.
Raises is dot.LA’s weekly feature highlighting venture capital funding news across Southern California’s tech and startup ecosystem. Please send fundraising news to Kristin Snyder (kristinsnyder@dot.la).Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
LA Tech ‘Moves’: New Head of Originals at Snap, New President at FaZe Clan
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
“Moves”, our roundup of job changes in L.A. tech, is presented by Interchange.LA, dot.LA's recruiting and career platform connecting Southern California's most exciting companies with top tech talent. Create a free Interchange.LA profile here—and if you're looking for ways to supercharge your recruiting efforts, find out more about Interchange.LA's white-glove recruiting service by emailing Sharmineh O’Farrill Lewis (sharmineh@dot.la). Please send job changes and personnel moves to moves@dot.la.
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FaZe Clan brought on Zach Katz as the gaming and media company’s new president and chief operating officer. Katz was previously the chief executive officer of the music tech investment fund Raised in Space Enterprises.
TikTok brand factory LINK Agency promoted Dustin Poteet to chief creative officer. Poteet was previously creative director at the firm.
Livestream shopping platform Talkshoplive hired Tradesy co-founder John Hall as its chief technology officer. Universal Music Group Nashville's former vice president of digital marketing, Tony Grotticelli, also joins the company as vice president of marketing.
Anjuli Millan will take over as head of original content at Snap after three years of overseeing production for the division.
Tech and media company Blavity hired Nikki Crump as general manager of agency. Crump joins the company from Burrell Communications Group.
O'Neil Digital Solutions, which provides customer communications and experience management for the health care industry, hired Eric Ramsey as national account sales executive. Ramsey joins from T/O Printing.
Investment firm Cresset Partners named Tammy Funasaki as managing director of business development. Funasaki previously served as head of investor relations for Breakwater Management.
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Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
Snapchat’s New Controls Could Let Parents See Their Kids’ Friend Lists
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
Snapchat is preparing to roll out enhanced parental controls that would allow parents to see who their teenagers are chatting with on the social media app, according to screenshots of the upcoming feature.
Snap’s parental controls.
Courtesy of Watchful.
Snapchat is planning to introduce Family Center, which would allow parents to see who their children are friends with on the app and who they’ve messaged within the last seven days, according to screenshots provided by Watchful, a product intelligence company. Parents would also be able help their kids report abuse or harassment.
The parental controls are still subject to change before finally launching publicly, as the Family Center screenshots—which were first reported by TechCrunch—reflect features that are still under development.
Santa Monica-based Snap and other social media giants have faced mounting criticism for not doing more to protect their younger users—some of whom have been bullied, sold deadly drugs and sexually exploited on their platforms. State attorneys general have urged Snap and Culver City-based TikTok to strengthen their parental controls, with both companies’ apps especially popular among teens.
A Snap spokesperson declined to comment on Friday. Previously, Snap representatives have told dot.LA that the company is developing tools that will provide parents with more insight into how their children are engaging on Snapchat and allow them to report troubling content.
Yet Snap’s approach to parental controls could still give teens some privacy, as parents wouldn’t be able to read the actual content of their kids’ conversations, according to TechCrunch. (The Family Center screenshots seen by dot.LA do not detail whether parents can see those conversations).
In addition, teenage users would first have to accept an invitation from their parents to join the in-app Family Center before those parents can begin monitoring their social media activity, TechCrunch reported.
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.