This Week in ‘Raises’: Zest AI Snags $50M, Kingswood Capital Collects $500M

Decerry Donato

Decerry Donato is a reporter at dot.LA. Prior to that, she was an editorial fellow at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.

This Week in ‘Raises’: Zest AI Snags $50M, Kingswood Capital Collects $500M
Modified by Joshua Letona

Online financial platform Zest AI raised fresh funding to continue expanding access to AI-automated credit underwriting for all lenders. While cybersecurity products developer MedCrypt landed more funding to scale its cryptography, behavior monitoring, and vulnerability inventory products across various types of medical devices.

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Venture Capital

Zest AI, a Burbank-based online financial platform intended to improve credit underwriting, raised $50 million in a new growth round co-led by Insight Partners and CMFG Ventures.

San Diego-based cybersecurity products developer MedCrypt raised $25 million in a Series B funding round from Intuitive Ventures, Johnson & Johnson Innovation–JJDC, Inc, Section 32, Eniac Ventures, Anzu Partners, and Dolby Family Ventures.

West Hollywood-based digital card and gifting platform Givingli raised $10 million in a Series A funding round led by Seven Seven Six.

OptionsMD, a Los Angeles-based telehealth startup, raised $3.8 million in pre-seed funding led by Bread & Butter Ventures.

Calabasas-based instant checkout platform TAGS Commerce raised a $3.5 million pre-seed funding round from XRC Labs, Gaingels, Not Boring, Tiny Capital, Vibe Capital, Unpopular Ventures.

Funds

According to an SEC filing, Kingswood Capital Management, a Los Angeles-based venture capital and private equity firm raised a $506 million 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 Decerry Donato (decerrydonato@dot.la).

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Starships Were Meant To Fly: Astrolab's New Jeep-Sized Rover Gets a Lift from SpaceX

Lon Harris
Lon Harris is a contributor to dot.LA. His work has also appeared on ScreenJunkies, RottenTomatoes and Inside Streaming.
Starships Were Meant To Fly: Astrolab's New Jeep-Sized Rover Gets a Lift from SpaceX
Photo by Samson Amore

This is the web version of dot.LA’s daily newsletter. Sign up to get the latest news on Southern California’s tech, startup and venture capital scene.

Local Los Angeles-area startup Astrolab Inc. has designed a new lunar vehicle called FLEX, short for Flexible Logistics and Exploration Rover. About the size of a Jeep Wrangler, FLEX is designed to move cargo around the surface of the moon on assignment. It’s a bit larger than NASA’s Mars rovers, like Perseverance, but as it’s designed for transport and mobility rather than precision measurement, it can travel much faster, at speeds of up to 15 miles per hour across the lunar surface.

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Meet the Creator Economy’s Version of LinkedIn

Kristin Snyder

Kristin Snyder is dot.LA's 2022/23 Editorial Fellow. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.

Meet the Creator Economy’s Version of LinkedIn
Creatorland

This is the web version of dot.LA’s daily newsletter. Sign up to get the latest news on Southern California’s tech, startup and venture capital scene.

LinkedIn hasn’t caught on with Gen Z—in fact, 96% rarely use their existing account.

Considering 25% of young people want to be full-time content creators and most influencers aren’t active on LinkedIn, traditional networking sites aren’t likely to meet these needs.

Enter CreatorLand.

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https://twitter.com/ksnyder_db

This Week in ‘Raises’: Total Network Services Gains $9M, Autio Secures $5.9M

Decerry Donato

Decerry Donato is a reporter at dot.LA. Prior to that, she was an editorial fellow at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.

This Week in ‘Raises’: Total Network Services Gains $9M, Autio Secures $5.9M
This Week in ‘Raises’:

It has been a slow week in funding, but a local decentralized computing network managed to land $9 million to accelerate deployment of its new product called Universal Communication Identifier (UCID™). Another local company that secured capital included Kevin Costner’s location-based audio storytelling platform and the funding will go toward expanding the app’s content library and expanding into additional regions in the United States.

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