Welcome to these new Members of the OC Startup Council: Business Sales Accelerator Academy, NeighborING, ReadySetConnect Business Sales Accelerator Academy train direct sales people, entrepreneurs and small business owners to become more effective at generating new business so they increase their bottom line profits & improve their local economy. Business Sales Accelerator Academies initial target audience are the millions of... Read more →

NGD Systems Raises $20 Million in Series C Funding to Accelerate the Deployment of the World’s First NVMe Computational Storage Drive The latest round includes new investments from MIG Capital and Western Digital Capital Global, Ltd, that enables artificial intelligence, machine learning and edge computing within computational storage Irvine-based NGD Systems, the leader and pioneer in Computational Storage, today announced... Read more →

Alliance Bank Improves Customer Experience with Ephesoft's Intelligent Capture Solution IRVINE, Calif., Dec. 9, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Ephesoft, Inc., an industry leader in enterprise content capture and data discovery solutions, and Alliance Bank Malaysia Berhad, a bank well known for serving Malaysian small and medium enterprises (SMEs), today announced that the bank has implemented Ephesoft Transact for intelligent capture automation... Read more →

Curogram Closes $1.8M Series Seed Round to Lead Evolution of Two-Way Messaging for the Healthcare Industry Round includes Zuora Founder, Chairman and CEO Tien Tzuo and Over 80 Medical Professionals Recently praised by Google Health and Samsung Health for modernizing healthcare communications, Curogram, the leading patient-centric universal healthcare messaging platform, announced it has closed an over-subscribed $1.8M series seed round.... Read more →

Kajabi Receives Minority Growth Investment From Spectrum Equity Funding is Kajabi's first institutional financing since 2010 launch IRVINE, Calif., Nov. 7, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Kajabi, an industry-leading all-in-one platform helping individuals and small and mid-size businesses (SMBs) create and monetize online courses, training materials, and other content, announced today that it received a minority growth investment from Spectrum Equity, a... Read more →

Restaurant365 Receives $88M In Funding Led By ICONIQ Capital Series C funding from Silicon Valley growth equity firm allows Restaurant365 to expand its software capabilities, increase teams. IRVINE, Calif., June 27, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Restaurant365®, the only cloud-based restaurant accounting software boasting an all-in-one restaurant management solution, has successfully closed an $88 million minority investment led by ICONIQ Capital, a... Read more →

Top Mexican Sports TV Network to Purchase $5 Million of Shares of Black Ridge Acquisition Corp. Expanded Alliance Expected to Broaden Allied Esports’ Deployment into Latin America with Development of Dedicated Digital Esports Channel and Flagship Esports Venue IRVINE, Calif. -- (BUSINESS WIRE) -- TV Azteca, a Grupo Salinas company and the top sports television network in Mexico, and Black... Read more →

OC Startup Events - there are more new startup events for techies and software companies listed every day in our OC Startup Council Events Calendar! Check out the Orange County tech startup conferences, happy hours, workshops, meetups, and seminars our members are posting here. You can meet new people, develop new relationships, learn new skills and expertise, advance your high... Read more →

Newport Beach's Stradling’s Securities Litigation, M&A, and Venture Capital practice groups were ranked in the newly released 2019 edition of The Legal 500 United States. Congratulations to the OC-based Stradling Venture Capital team (a Sponsor of the OC Startup Council) for receiving high marks for being “business-oriented, direct, efficient, and commercially minded.” Recent deal highlights included Mark Skaist advising Acacia... Read more →

Medical Waste Processing Technology Startup OnSite Raises $3.5 Million Seed In An Oversubscribed Round Investment Led by Mark IV Capital and Co-Led By The Cove Fund II. Proceeds Will be Used to Accelerate Sales and Employee Growth NEWPORT BEACH, CALIF. (PRWEB) MAY 22, 2019: OnSite Waste Technologies, a leader in modernizing on-site medical waste disposal, today announces the completion of... Read more →

Pritzker Group Venture Capital Leads Round IRVINE, Calif., April 29, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Specright, Inc., a software company that enables customers to control critical supply chain specifications such as packaging, products, and raw materials, announced today an $8.8 million Series A round of funding. Led by Pritzker Group Venture Capital (PGVC), with participation from previous investors Okapi Venture Capital, Fika... Read more →

Local OC angel investors recently realized a 15x return from a 2003 investment in CaseStack thanks to its $255 million sale to Hub Group, Inc.. IRVINE, CALIF. (PRWEB) FEBRUARY 14, 2019 Tech Coast Angels (TCA) announced its sixth highest exit ever when Hub Group, Inc. recently purchased CaseStack for $255 million. This successful exit was unique in many ways: the... Read more →

Parcel Pending Announces Acquisition by Neopost Agreement will help bring Parcel Pending’s innovative package management solutions to more residential, commercial, retail and universities properties nationwide. IRVINE, Calif., Jan. 31, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Parcel Pending, the nation's leading provider of innovative package management solutions, today announced that it has been acquired by Paris-based Neopost, a global leader in mail solutions,... Read more →

Orange County fintech startup darling, Acorns, recently closed a new investment round that brings the investing and savings startup’s valuation up to a whopping $860 million! This funding was a Series E round of $105 million, as previously reported here in December. Acorns’ investors in this financing round include big venture investing names such as NBCUniversal, BlackRock, Bain Capital Ventures,... Read more →

2018 brought the most growth capital investing to our region since 2000, according to Pricewaterhouse Coopers and CB Insights, which published their annual "MoneyTree" report of regional venture capital trends and figures last week. The overall number of funding transactions in the Los Angeles/Orange County region decreased slightly (to 419 deals from 2017's 432). But 2018 yielded $6 Billion of... Read more →

Want to know what's in store for the global Innovation Economy? Check out Silicon Valley Bank's latest State of the Markets quarterly report here. It covers the latest trends and market factors for innovative growth companies, investors, and their advisors. 2018 Fourth Quarter "In the face of heightened geopolitical concerns, U.S. venture firms are on pace for decade-high fundraising. That... Read more →

Vincit, a software development and design company based in Irvine, Palo Alto, and Finland recently acquired Devise Interactive, an award-winning Irvine-based agency focused on brand strategy, UI/UX and software development. “Orange County is a well-known hub for many leading food and restaurant brands. With Devise Interactive we have even stronger expertise to serve these industries”, says CEO of Vincit California,... Read more →

Acorns Grow Inc. is rumored to be seeking new funding from investors that would give it an estimated worth of $700 million. An exciting Orange County-based growth startup that offers digital wealth management services, Acorns is said to be raising more than $100 million in a new investment round. According to Bloomberg News, no one would identify the backer and... Read more →

BlackBerry Limited recently announced it was acquiring Cylance, Orange County's artificial intelligence and cybersecurity leader, for $1.4 billion in cash. The deal is expected to close by February 2019, pending approvals and closing conditions. Founded in Orange County in 2012, Cylance's cybersecurity software uses artificial intelligence, algorithmic science, and machine learning. This predicts and prevents known and unknown threats to... Read more →

Orange-based ListReports recently received an additional $550,000 to support its continued development of technology that makes the home buying and selling process a delightful experience. The new funding is the seventh tranche of financing Lighter Capital has provided the tech startup, dating back to 2016, with a total of $2.042 million in funding to date. Since the first Lighter Capital... Read more →

OC’s leading angel investment group, Tech Coast Angels (TCA), recently announced that the venture capital firm SWS Venture Capital (SWS) joined its network as an affiliate member. Steve Streit, the General Partner and Chairman of SWS, received capital and mentorship from TCA when he founded Green Dot, which is now a multi-billion-dollar publicly-traded NYSE company. “This is truly a full-circle... Read more →

Nimble, an Orange County-based consumer tech brand committed to creating sustainably made electronics, announced its equity round investment of $1.5 million led by Okapi Capital, with additional funding provided by early stage investor, PivotNorth Capital. The financing will be used to fund all Nimble’s initial costs, including product development, production, distribution and marketing. Jeff Bocan, partner at Okapi, and Tim... Read more →

Our friends at PriceWaterhouseCoopers are back with more interesting numbers quantifying the local Orange County capital investment and funding environment. While the first two quarters of 2018 demonstrated generally strong deal flow, unfortunately it looks like deals and funding activity in the Los Angeles and OC region declined again last quarter. As you can see, the dollar volume of that... Read more →

Irvine-based Cirrus Insight recently closed a “significant equity investment” to help continue its growth. Founded in 2011, Cirrus Insight has succeeded by offering an all-in-one sales productivity platform with Salesforce CRM integration, including plug-ins for the Gmail and Outlook. This enables salespeople to work faster and smarter from their inboxes and calendars. The company has been named to the INC... Read more →

PriceSpider, the Irvine-based retail data technology company, has entered into a new strategic partnership with Frontier Capital, a Charlotte, North Carolina-based growth equity firm that specializes in software and technology-enabled business services companies. The partnership includes a significant growth investment in PriceSpider to help accelerate the growth of the company’s consumer conversion intelligence and brand optimization software. PriceSpider serves hundreds... Read more →