FortySix Venture Capital LLC, (46VC), a Tulsa-based venture capital firm, is excited to announce its strategic investment in Exum Instruments’ Series A funding round, marking the first investment from their recently launched Kinetic Fund.

Exum Instruments, a Denver-based scientific instruments company, has developed the revolutionary Massbox^™, a cutting-edge instrument that democratizes mass spectrometry analysis. Unlike traditional analytical tools that were primarily accessible to PhD chemists, the Massbox’s innovative design and user-friendly software empower individuals across various scientific disciplines to conduct accurate and efficient chemical characterization in a matter of minutes with mobile capability. For a variety of end users, this accelerates new material development, quality control, failure analysis and more.

This round of funding will play a pivotal role in supporting the company’s expansion plans. With the funding, Exum Instruments aims to establish a state-of-the-art manufacturing plant, enabling them to scale up production significantly. This increased manufacturing capacity will not only meet the rapidly growing demand for the Massbox^™ but also position Exum Instruments as a key player in the scientific instruments market. Massbox^™ has been adopted by several manufacturing concerns and high-profile laboratories, including the Department of Energy national labs, Los Alamos National Lab and the SLAC Accelerator Lab. Tracy Poole, Managing Partner of 46VC had this to say about the investment: “We were excited to be in a position to join with a group of local investors like Energy Innovation Capital, Advantage Capital, Boyd Street Ventures, Alchemy Capital and Cortado Ventures to advance innovation in the materials and energy spaces and help bring a top-notch team of innovators to build in Tulsa“. Jeff Williams, Exum CEO stated, “We are thrilled and honored to receive support from some of the strongest VCs in the region, and we look forward to leveraging their broad experience and connections to fuel our growth.”

The investment will enhance the local economy and promote innovation in the region by generating 25-30 high-tech jobs in Tulsa. This significant contribution is made possible through 46VC’s special partnership with the Oklahoma Center for the Advancement of Science and Technology (OCAST) leveraging OCAST’s recent investment of U.S. Treasury’s SSBCI funds in 46VC’s Kinetic Fund.

About 46VC

46VC is a venture capital fund manager based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. 46VC has a regional strategy to invest in startups and technologies in the heartland region where it has unique access to deal flow and domain expertise.

For more information on 46VC please visit the firm’s website at www.46.capital

About Exum Instruments

Exum Instruments is a scientific instrumentation company building instruments and software ecosystems to increase the speed of materials development and discovery, offering easy access to high performance at a low cost. Exum’s first instrument, The Massbox^™, is the first Laser Ablation Laser Ionization Time of Flight Mass Spectrometer (LALI-TOF-MS) on the market, capable of analyzing any sample you can throw at it – precisely, rapidly, and inexpensively.

For more information on Exum, please visit: www.exuminstruments.com

Investment round led by Bank of America with significant participation from Pivot Investment Partners and ING Ventures

OpenFin, the operating system (OS) of enterprise productivity, today announced that it has secured $35 million in Series D investment. The latest funding round was led by Bank of America with significant participation from Pivot Investment Partners and ING Ventures. Additional investors in the round include CME Ventures, CTC Venture Capital, SC Ventures and Tribeca Early Stage Partners.

The investment will be used to help accelerate the adoption of OpenFin OS across the financial industry and beyond. OpenFin’s web-based OS is becoming a de facto standard in financial services for powering next-generation applications and digital experiences for employees and clients. The software is now used at more than 3,800 banks, wealth, and asset management firms in 60+ countries.

The funding round comes during a period of record growth for OpenFin driven by rapid adoption of OpenFin Workspace, the visual interface of OpenFin OS. Introduced in 2021, OpenFin Workspace includes an app launcher, notification center, universal search, an enterprise browser with default interoperability, and app store capabilities. These components help unify and simplify the end user experience across both internal and 3rd party apps, significantly enhancing productivity and reducing operational risk.

According to multiple recent surveys from Forbes Technology Council, Harvard Business Review¹ and others, end users experience anywhere from 2 to 4 hours of lost productivity each day, often referred to as the “toggle tax”. The wasted time stems from employees using anywhere from 7 to 35 apps a day, toggling between those apps thousands of times a day, and individually searching apps an hour a day. This translates to a cost of millions or tens of millions of dollars a year in lost productivity depending on the size of an organization.

Dinkar Jetley, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Pivot Investment Partners, said: “OpenFin provides the financial industry with a truly open workspace platform that is unrivaled when it comes to app distribution, security, interoperability, scale and governance. We have backed OpenFin’s vision since 2015 and are delighted to support the company as they expand across the financial sector and beyond.”

Last year, OpenFin announced its expansion into the government sector via a strategic partnership and investment from In-Q-Tel (IQT).

Mazy Dar, CEO of OpenFin said: “This is a significant milestone in OpenFin’s mission to enable openness, app interoperability and end user productivity across the financial industry. OpenFin Workspace is empowering financial institutions to transform experience for their employees and their customers, replacing traditional browsers with an enterprise browser designed for work. We’re delighted to welcome Bank of America as our newest strategic investor and we’re grateful for the continued support from Pivot Investment Partners and so many other existing investors.”

Other major OpenFin investors include Bain Capital Ventures, Barclays, DRW Venture Capital, HSBC, J.P. Morgan, NYCA Partners and Wells Fargo Strategic Capital.

About OpenFin

Move Fast. Break Nothing. OpenFin is The Operating System of Enterprise Productivity, enabling app distribution, workspace management and workflow automation. OpenFin OS currently runs at more than 3,800 banks and buy-side firms with thousands of internal apps and apps from the global vendor community. OpenFin investors include Bain Capital Ventures, Barclays, In-Q-Tel, CME Ventures, CTC Venture Capital, DRW Venture Capital, HSBC, ING Ventures, J.P. Morgan, NYCA Partners, Pivot Investment Partners, Standard Chartered and Wells Fargo Strategic Capital among others. The company is based in New York with an office in London and presence in Hong Kong and Singapore.

BlackSoil , a Mumbai-based leading alternative credit provider, has made an undisclosed investment in Mozark, a Singapore-based DeepTech company. This investment is in line with BlackSoil’s investment strategy of focusing on new-age businesses in the DeepTech sector.

Mozark has developed an innovative synthetic observability platform that assists businesses in identifying issues within their digital supply chain and enhancing the quality of user experience. Further, it has experienced a remarkable 2x growth in recurring revenue over the past year and has onboarded renowned clients such as Disney+, Sony, Globe, Marina Bay Sands, Orange, and Carrefour.

Commenting on the same, Ankur Bansal, Co-Founder and Director of BlackSoil said, “As the world continues to shift towards a digital world, the demand for a superior, hyper-connected digital experience is going to grow. Mozark’s groundbreaking synthetic observability platform enables businesses to identify and improve specific elements within their digital supply chain, ultimately enhancing the overall quality of user experience.With its impressive growth in recurring revenue and partnerships with industry-leading clients, Mozark is well-positioned to lead the market. We are excited to partner with Mozark and believe that our debt capital will facilitate their exponential growth and solidify their position as an industry leader.”

Singapore headquartered and a member of International Telecommunication Union, Mozark is a developer of digital experience management platform that helps enterprise customers measure real-user experience by monitoring on real devices connected to real networks. The platform uses a GAI engine that helps enterprises obtain insights to make improvements and to deliver rich experience and care to end customers. Mozark works with Digital Infrastructure providers, Digital Apps, and Digital Enterprises to enhance digital experience, thus ensuring alignment across ecosystems.

“In a hyper-connected world where connectivity powers innovative business models, businesses cannot afford toprovide inferior quality of digital experience to end customers. Inferior quality has a huge cost both for theenterprises and for Digital Energy sobriety. 5G and further technologies only exacerbate this trend. Mozark’s toolsare positioned to help various stakeholders whether it is connectivity providers such as Telecom Operators,Regulators, or Digital App owners to measure and to diagnose the quality of their services under variousconnectivity conditions. We are delighted to partner with BlackSoil. Their debt will help us in expanding ourpresence in newer markets, invest more in R&D, and grow product offerings’ ‘ said Fabien, Founder and co-CEO ofMozark.

Mozark has offices in India, Philippines, Malaysia, and Paris and a customer base in Europe, SEA, India, and the USA. It was founded by Kartik Raja, Fabien Renaudineau and Chandra Ramamoorthy; and is backed by Kalaari Capital.

About Blacksoil: 

BlackSoil currently manages an alternative credit platform comprising its systemically important NBFC and AIF. Ithas built a quality loan book consisting of top-notch investments, having deployed $280 Mn across 140 deals and having an AUM of $120 Mn. The portfolio includes investments in 9 unicorns such as Upstox, Udaan, Zetwerk, OYO Rooms, and Spinny, as well as other prominent companies like Curefoods – a major player in the cloud kitchen industry, Blu-Smart – a pioneer in EV ride-hailing, and ideaForge – an IPO-bound drone manufacturer.