Mermaid, the open source diagramming and charting tool, has long been popular with developers for its ability to create diagrams using a Markdown-like language. Now the company, which builds hosted services around the open source project, announced that it has raised a $7.5 million seed funding round from OCV, Sequoia and Microsoft’s M12 fund (among about a dozen more investors).

HData, a Birmingham, AL-based company using AI and automation to help the U.S. energy industry to file, explore, analyze, and leverage regulatory data, raised $10M in Series A funding. The round was led by Buoyant Ventures, with participation from Victorum Capital, Hyde Park Venture Partners, and Firebrand Ventures, among others.

Returnmates, now rebranded as Sway, is the latest to attract new venture capital for its approach to delivery and returns that focuses on the customer. The Los Angeles-based company raised $19.5 million in Series A led by 7GC.

Former TrendKite Founder and CEO Matt Allison has raised $6.3 million in seed funding to launch Handraise. Austin-based Handraise will create a platform powered by artificial intelligence to help companies increase the impact of their press coverage. Silverton Partners, Floodgate, Bill Wood Ventures, Firebrand VC, Aperiam Ventures, Active Capital, Sputnik ATX VC, Capital Factory, and a handful of world-class angel investors back Handraise.

A Golden-based tech company offering simulation training for enterprises recently secured fresh capital. The Regis Co. raised a $3.5 million seed round to pivot from a service provider working solely with enterprises to a SaaS company offering its solution to all types of organizations. Different from the e-learning space, simulation-based learning takes users through in-depth storylines where they decide what to do in each circumstance.

Videate – the pioneer in production automation for software how-to videos – announced its latest funding round. The financing brings the company’s total to $6.5 million and adds Firebrand Ventures, alongside return investors S3 Ventures and Tensility Venture Partners. The funding will accelerate the four-year-old company’s AI roadmap and growth initiatives.

Realto, an electronic trading platform that helps real estate investors buy and sell interests in projects more easily, closed its latest round of venture capital, raising $4.5 million. Realto was co-founded in 2021 by CEO Brian King, a former BATS Global Markets executive, and Jeff Kinney, a 26-year financial services veteran with experience raising equity capital for mutual fund companies like Invesco and Goldman Sachs.

Miami-based 8base will double its product development, sales, and engineering teams after securing $10.6 million from investors. The company, a low-code development platform, is hiring and investing in product development to scale the business. 8base's software makes it possible for companies to build digital products – like APIs, cloud-based hosting and security – in a matter of weeks, all without a large team of software engineers.

Nivati, based in South Jordan, announced a $4 million seed round, $500,000 higher than originally planned. The round was led by Firebrand Ventures (Boulder, CO & Kansas City, KS) with participation from Access Ventures (Denver area, CO), Service Provider Capital (Golden, CO), Peak Capital (Provo), and angel investor Aaron Skonnard (Pluralsight).

HData, an early-stage RegTech startup delivering automated compliance and instant business intelligence to the U.S. regulated energy industry, has announced the closure of an oversubscribed $3.1 million seed investment round. HData’s seed round was led by Chicago-based Hyde Park Venture Partners and co-led by Firebrand Ventures, based in Boulder, Austin and Kansas City. Firebrand partner John Fein will join HData’s Board of Directors.

Spruce, the leading provider of lifestyle services to the multifamily sector, today announced it has acquired The Minte, a startup bringing hotel-style housekeeping to luxury apartment residences. The acquisition allows Spruce to expand its footprint into the Chicago area with premier property management companies, while The Minte gains a greater ability to scale and serve more clients.

Dwolla has closed on $21 million in funding, capital that it will use to continue building out the functionality of its service and specifically how it integrates and provides more of the responsiveness of card payments; hiring more talent; and starting the process of taking its rails to more markets outside of the U.S.

Ephemeral Tattoo, which developed an ink that fades away in about a year, has raised $20 million in a funding round just four months after opening its first studio in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The Series A round was led by Anthos Capital LP, which also invested in the popular Conor McGregor-backed sports recovery system TIDL. The funding came after Ephemeral quickly found TikTok fame among those who can’t commit to a permanent tattoo.

Endpoint management platform Automox today announced it has closed a $110 million equity round led by Insight Partners. The funds, which come as Automox’s customer base grew 200% from June 2019, bring the startup’s total raised to over $152 million.

The company, a spinoff from Google-affiliated Sidewalk Labs, hopes to circumvent privacy concerns by making location-based data “synthetic.” It’s also planning on putting out a new scenario-modeling product this year.

ASG LegalTech, a portfolio company of Alpine Investors, today announced that it has acquired Headnote, a novel online payments platform providing compliant ePayments and AR management for law firms of all sizes. Headnote is the latest addition to ASG LegalTech’s platform of rapidly growing legal Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) products including PracticePanther, Bill4Time and MerusCase.

Detroit-based Aadya Security Inc. announced Tuesday that it has closed on $2.7 million in seed funding from three separate out-of-state investment groups; Firebrand Ventures out of Kansas City, Mo., New York City-based 645 Ventures, and Next Coast Ventures in Austin, Texas. Additionally, the company is formally rolling out its new security platform, called Marzo4, targeted toward small and medium-sized businesses.

Today, PathSpot announced the closing of $6.5 million in a Series A round led by Valor Siren Ventures I L.P. (VSV), bringing the company's total funding to $10.5 million.

After emerging from stealth in 2015, the Boulder, Colorado-based startup went on to raise $12.6 million in a series of funding rounds. This week, Automox nabbed $30 million in a series B round led by Koch Disruptive Technologies, with participation from CRV and CrowdStrike’s Falcon Fund (in partnership with Accel), bringing its total raised to over $40 million.

Threatcare, an Austin-based cybersecurity startup that has raised funding from local venture capital firms and is known for its inclusive business practices, has been acquired by Tampa-based security company ReliaQuest.

PreFix announced Wednesday that it has closed on $2.7 million in funding. The Austin-based home maintenance startup reported that Chicago Ventures led the seed-stage round, which was oversubscribed. To date, PreFix has raised $5 million.

Miami entrepreneur Albert Santalo believes he and his team have the answer: 8base. Santalo created 8base as a platform for building applications with only a front-end presentation developer.

The company announced today that it has raised a $1.3 million seed round to help meet production demand for its line of sustainable bed sheets made from eucalyptus trees. Sheets & Giggles, which launched in 2018, is on pace to quadruple sales in its second year.

Automox, a global provider of cloud-native automated patch management and configuration management solutions, today announced it closed a $9.3 million investment round from leading cybersecurity venture capital firms and long-standing industry veterans.

The Minte, which now employs roughly 60 people, is today announcing that it has raised $2.25 million in a round that brings the company’s total seed funding to $4.7 million. Dundee Venture Capital led this newest round; other investors in the company include MATH Venture Partners, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, Firebrand Ventures, Blue Note Ventures, and numerous angel investors.

Replica, the data-gathering tool created within Sidewalk Labs that maps the movement of people in cities, is now a company. The newly formed company, which is headed by Nick Bowden, also announced Thursday it has raised $11 million in a Series A funding round from investors Innovation Endeavors, Firebrand Ventures and Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund.

Dwolla, a darling of the Iowa startup scene, just wrapped up a $12 million round of funding that will help the tech firm nearly double its workforce.