More often than not, hiding behind the paywalls of many fitness apps is premium content such as virtual fitness classes led by celebrity trainers that require additional spending in order to access. Shred, the digital fitness app, goes against the grain by offering a constantly growing library of high-quality workouts within its subscription and provides the opportunity to make your workouts social by including your friends. Since the company’s founding in 2018, more than 3M workouts and 76M exercises have been completed on the platform. LA TechWatch caught up with CEO Adam Weinstein to learn more about the company’s experience growing during COVID, future plans to roll out new products including video-based social workouts, and Shred’s recent funding round.
Startups
SUMA Wealth Helps Millennial Latinos Take Control of their Financial Futures
Latinos are one of the fastest-growing demographic groups in the United States, representing approximately 20% of the US population. However, 50% of Latinos are underbanked. SUMA Wealth is the fintech platform designed specifically for the Latino community to engage, educate, and empower young millennial/ Gen Z Latinos to manage their finances and take control of their financial futures. LA TechWatch caught up with CEO and Cofounder Beatríz Acevedo to learn more about the importance of financial inclusion for Latinos, the company’s goal to help create generational wealth, and future plans.
The 12 Largest Global Startup Funding Rounds of October 2020
TeachMe’s Math Games Uses Gaming to Teach Math to Students
“Teachers who build math and language games are our best experts in curriculum, but they don’t fully understand how children play. Developers who build games don’t understand how children learn. We wanted to combine these worlds of learning and play in a powerful new way that can transform the learning experience for kids around the world.” LA TechWatch caught up with CEO and Cofounder Bill Kara to learn more about Math Games, how the shift to online learning has impacted demand, and the company’s future plans.
Radiant Raised $1.2M to Bring Portable Nuclear Microreactors to the Market
Most entrepreneurs believe that they are going to change the world. However, there are very few that actually will have such an impact. Meet Doug Bernauer, a former SpaceX engineer that left the company to launch Radiant, an LA startup developing the world’s first portable, nuclear microreactor. The company’s vision is grand and if they are successful, they will be able to seamlessly bring energy to many places that need it the most. LA TechWatch caught up with Bernauer to learn more about the company’s vision, future plans, and recent funding round from investors that include Charlie Songhurst, Hank Vigil, Josh Manchester, and Tom McInerney.
The LA TechWatch October 2020 LA Venture Capital Funding Report
The 6 Largest LA Tech Startup Funding Rounds of October 2020
Ordermark Raises Another $120M for its Leading Online Ordering and Restaurant Management Solution
Ordermark has become one of the fastest-growing online ordering management platforms, helping restaurants – whether small and local or large chains – manage incoming orders from all the different online ordering platforms into a single easy-to-manage dashboard. The company operates Nextbite, a virtual kitchen marketplace enabling turnkey, delivery-only restaurant brands to launch with key infrastructure in place. LA TechWatch caught up with CEO and Cofounder Alex Canter to learn more about Ordermark’s evolution from a solution originally conceived to meet the needs of his family’s deli into a robust nationwide restaurant management solution powering thousands of restaurants, the company’s experience supporting the restaurant industry through the pandemic to support their operations, the rise of virtual kitchens, and the company’s latest funding round from investors that include Softbank Vision Fund 2 and Act One Ventures, bringing the total funding raised to $150.6M for the three-year-old company.
HireHuman Reimagines How to Fund a Startup by Launching Ballot Bevs Just in Time for the Election
Raising capital for a startup is hard and can be grueling. Drawing inspiration from MailChimp and Airbnb, two companies that took an unconventional approach to initial funding, Michael Fisher, CEO and Cofounder of HireHuman, a video recruitment platform for customer service, launched Ballot Bevs, a collection of limited-edition, election-themed coffee and tea boxes to drive revenue to bootstrap HireHuman. Fisher shares more about the imminent launch of HireHuman, Ballot Bev’s impressive traction heading into the election, and the motivation behind delaying institutional funding.
TigerConnect Raises $45M to Improve Communication Across Healthcare
Experiencing 30% revenue growth since the onset of COVID-19, TigerConnect realized that the healthcare system is ready to embrace a modern care collaboration and communication platform. The company’s platform allows healthcare professionals across various teams – urgent care, imaging centers, SNFs (registered skilled nursing facilities), etc – to instantly interact with each other and receive the latest updates and critical information on patients. The solution is trusted by than 7K + healthcare organizations to communicate and coordinate care quickly and securely via video, voice, or text. LA TechWatch caught up with CEO Brad Brooks to discuss TigerConnect’s rapid growth, the launch of its latest products, and recent funding round from investors that include HealthQuest Capital, with additional investment coming from New Leaf Ventures, Montreux Growth Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, Invus, and Industry Ventures.
Centerfield is the Automated End-to-End Customer Acquisition Platform for the Biggest Brands
Jason Cohen, an ex-New Yorker sold his previous business, a performance-based marketing agency, and linked up with his cofounder, who had also recently sold his business. The duo launched Centerfield to bring technology-focused solutions to performance-based marketing. The company now automates end-to-end customer acquisition for brands, powering over 2M individual sales per year. Cohen shares some more insight into the state of acquisition and marketing, the company’s future plans, and impressive traction.