E-bike maker Cowboy raises a small funding round as it targets profitability next year

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Image Credits: Romain Dillet / TechCrunch

Cowboy, the Brussels-based company that has been designing and selling electric bikes that you can see in major cities across Europe, has closed a small, strategic funding round of €5 million (around $5.5 million at current exchange rates). That includes €1 million in debt facilities.

While the amount isn’t as impressive as some of Cowboy’s previous fundraises, the company has been looking for an investor outside of the traditional European VC firms that have already invested in the startup — an investor that could potentially open new doors. As a result, Cypress Capital is leading the round. The Hong Kong-based investment firm has strong ties with Taiwan, which is a key hub for the global bicycle industry.

“A lot of our Asian-based suppliers are Taiwanese for historical reasons. We are growing the portion of our European suppliers continuously as we have about half of our parts that come from European suppliers. But the other half comes from Asia and mostly from Taiwanese suppliers,” Cowboy co-founder and CEO Adrien Roose (pictured above right) told TechCrunch.

Existing investors Index Ventures, Hardware Club, Future Positive Capital, Isomer and Exor are also participating once again in Wednesday’s funding round. Cowboy will also launch an equity crowdfunding campaign to give an opportunity to its customers to invest in the company.

“We’ve been raising somewhere between €10 [million] and €20 million a year over the last few years,” Roose said. “And yeah, the amount has gone down. Last year we raised €8 million in equity and €5 million of debt. And now we’re just announcing a €5 million raise, which is a fairly small raise for a company of our size.”

According to him, the company needs to raise less capital because it requires less capital. Cowboy should be more or less breakeven on an EBITDA basis for the second half of this year. Next year, he says, the company will turn a profit for the first time since its inception.

“And we don’t want to raise more than what we need, especially in these market conditions,” Roose added. It doesn’t mean that Cowboy won’t raise ever again. However, it’s been a wild ride for the startup as the e-bike industry experienced a significant boost in sales after COVID-related lockdowns. The company’s valuation peaked around that time.

But then, demand slowed down quite drastically. VanMoof, another European e-bike startup backed by venture capitalists, declared bankruptcy. It had a chilling effect on the entire industry.

With this recent funding round, Cowboy is now valued at €40 million on a pre-money basis. But now, all eyes are on profitability — not the company’s valuation. “We’re starting to see a ray of sunshine after the rain,” Roose said.

And believe it or not, rain plays an important part in Cowboy’s sales. The company usually sells more bikes during the spring as people start thinking about cycling to work and other places. It’s been particularly rainy in Europe this year, so Cowboy’s sales have been a bit underwhelming.

Additional Cowboy form factors

The company originally focused on a single model and iterated on the design over the years. After Cowboy 1 came Cowboy 2, Cowboy 3 and Cowboy 4. The company is now moving away from numbers and expanding its lineup to other form factors.

Cowboy added the Cruiser, a model with an upright riding posture and a step-through version to appeal to more riders. This year, the company added the Cowboy Cross model, an all-road model that aims for comfort and long-distance trips.

Similarly, Cowboy has diversified its distribution channels. In addition to its online stores, Cowboy now sells its e-bikes in traditional bicycle stores. “Since last year, we started doing partnerships with local bike shops because the fact is that 80% of e-bikes sold in Europe are still sold through these bike shops, and so we want to embrace that,” Roose said.

Behind the scenes, Cowboy bikes share the same electronic platform and software features, such as theft alerts, crash detection, in-app challenges and AdaptivePower. This feature, which has been recently updated, automatically adjusts the power of the motor depending on the current slope or wind conditions.

“We’ve invested lots of time, efforts and capital into building that platform that works really well. And now we want to capitalize on it and essentially build a family of products,” Roose said. “So we have the Classic, the Cruiser, the Cross. And you will see more bikes from us in the future.”

With $6M in seed funding, Enso plans to bring AI agents to SMBs

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Enso products including email, recruiting and screening, newsletters, media relations and others

Image Credits: Enso

Running a small business means doing more with less. AI agents can help, but building custom agents for specific workflows remains challenging, even with today’s low-code/no-code tools. The idea behind Enso — which came out of stealth by announcing a $6 million seed funding round Tuesday — is to give small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) access to a wide range of preprogrammed AI agents that can handle repetitive tasks.

Founded by Mickey Haslavsky, the co-founder of API development platform RapidAPI, Enso offers industry-specific agents that promise to help customers do anything from managing their search engine optimization efforts to engaging with their Instagram followers, tracking competitors, writing newsletters, managing invoices and optimizing their Amazon stores. Enso pretrains and customizes these agents for about 70 different industries, from accountants to car dealerships, offering more than 1,000 bots in total.

Image Credits: Enso

Haslavsky told TechCrunch that his inspiration for Enso came from his parents, who ran a small music production company and a secondary school. He pointed out that, similar to his earlier venture RapidAPI, Enso is also fundamentally centered around integrations.

“When I started getting into this AI agent space, I realized that, one, if that works, it can bridge the gap [between small and large businesses] because it can be serviceable, because it can give services to smaller businesses on top of other software, and that’s where the integrations come in,” he said. “Second, I realized it doesn’t work. Because you try AI agents today, they’re pretty broken. Three, I realized that, from a business perspective this is just huge, because most of the services that can now be automated cost — as an alternative, if you’re going to an agency — $1,000 a month.”

A lot of the bots that Enso currently offers aim to combine the predictability of traditional workflow automation services, which are dependable but need step-by-step scripting, with the creativity of large language models (LLMs). Haslavsky explained that these bots tend to follow a set sequence of tasks to run a business’ Instagram account, for example. The LLM handles the copy and design, but that workflow is predefined and there is also a traditional scheduler, for example.

Image Credits: Enso

Often, that involves calling on multiple services. Enso offers a podcast agent, for example, that can automatically script podcasts and that then uses ElevenLabs for the text-to-speech part, a music service for the intro and outro, as well as a video service for creating a visual version.

One thing that’s different here is that Enso is taking an à la carte approach where access to every agent costs somewhere between $29 to $79 per month. Haslavsky told me that he decided on this model because most SMBs are constrained on budget and because he wanted to make it extremely easy to buy for them.

The question, of course, is how well those bots work in a real-world scenario — and whether businesses are even willing to turn over some of these functions to AI agents. Typically, there is a human in the loop for things like the podcast and newsletter agents, for example, but if the results are just middling and involve a lot of work to polish them into a product that a business owner would be willing to publish, then a $59+/month subscription (or even multiple subscriptions) may be hard to justify. It might be an easier sell for agents that create reports or manage the SEO voodoo that helps businesses rank better on Google — nobody expects authenticity from those, after all.

In the future, Enso may also offer a marketplace for third-party agents. The team is currently working on low-code/no-code visual tools for building those — but for now they are still focused on the foundational integrations to make that happen.

The company’s $6 million seed round was led by NFX, with participation from a number of angel investors, including Yossi Matias, the head of Google Research, and Shmil Levy, a former GP at Sequoia Capital.

“Small businesses are the backbone of our economy, yet they have passed by the AI revolution,” said Gigi Levy-Weiss, partner at NFX Ventures. “While larger businesses speed by leveraging AI to maximize productivity gains, small businesses struggle to perform the most basic of administrative tasks. Enso is one of the first companies recognizing this need and putting enterprise-grade AI in the hands of emerging companies, democratizing AI by providing access and scalability. We are thrilled to support Enso as it transforms the business landscape and empowers traditional businesses to thrive.”

a16z-backed fintech Tally, which raised $172M in funding, is shutting down after running out of cash

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The closed turquoise door on a yellow background. The concept of making decisions, entering new places, crossing borders. 3d render, 3d illustration

Image Credits: Sebastian Gorczowski (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Tally, a nine-year-old fintech that helped consumers manage and pay off their credit card debt, has shut down, according to the company.

In a LinkedIn post that was shared earlier Monday, founder and CEO Jason Brown said the “sad and difficult” decision to close down Tally was not the outcome the company had “hoped for,” but that “after exploring all options,” it was “unable to secure the necessary funding to continue our operations.” According to PitchBook, Tally was last valued at $855 million and had 183 employees. 

Tally’s model was initially designed to help people manage their credit cards and pay off high-interest debt through a lower interest loan that it offered. But in April, Tally announced it would be sunsetting its consumer app and shifting to B2B. At the time, the company said it had a launch partner, a “large publicly-traded consumer company with more than 50 million users,” that was launching in July. However, it never followed up with an announcement naming the company.

TechCrunch has reached out to the company for further details.

Founded in 2015, San Francisco-based Tally had raised $172 million in funding over the years. In October of 2022, Tally raised an $80 million Series D led by Sway Ventures. Andreessen Horowitz led its $50 million Series C round in 2019, which also included participation from Silicon Valley heavy hitters such as Kleiner Perkins, Shasta Ventures, Cowboy Ventures and Sway Ventures. 

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EXCLUSIVE: TPG nears $150M funding in India's Eruditus at $2.3B valuation

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Graduation cap as a part of laptop; edtech investor survey 2022

Image Credits: Boris Zhitkov (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Eruditus, an Indian edtech startup, is in advanced stages of talks to secure about $150 million in new funding, two sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch, in what would be the largest fundraise by an Indian education firm in years.

TPG, a major private equity player, is discussing to lead the investment, the sources said. The new investment will value Eruditus at up to $2.3 billion, according to proposed terms, the sources added, requesting anonymity as the deliberations are ongoing.

This valuation is tied to Eruditus meeting specific performance targets. Failing to hit these milestones could see the startup lose its value to at least $1.8 billion, the sources added. The potential new valuation represents a decrease from the $3.2 billion at which Eruditus was valued during its last funding round in August 2021.

Terms of the deal could still change in the coming weeks, the sources cautioned. Eruditus counts Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Prosus Ventures, Accel, SoftBank, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Peak XV among its backers.

Eruditus, founded 14 years ago, collaborates with leading global universities to provide executive education programs for businesses and individuals. The startup generates over two-thirds of its revenue from international markets.

TPG declined to comment. Eruditus didn’t respond to request for comment outside business hours.

The potential $150 million investment in an edtech firm could reinvigorate a sector that has struggled since the reopening of schools post-pandemic. Many edtech companies have faced devaluations or closures as their growth stalled with the return to in-person learning.

The Indian edtech market is also reeling from the sudden collapse of Byju’s, once valued at $22 billion. The Bengaluru-headquartered startup is mired in lawsuits and governance challenges and staring at insolvency proceedings.

a16z-backed fintech Tally, which raised $172M in funding, is shutting down after running out of cash

by with No Comment Tech

The closed turquoise door on a yellow background. The concept of making decisions, entering new places, crossing borders. 3d render, 3d illustration

Image Credits: Sebastian Gorczowski (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Tally, a nine-year-old fintech that helped consumers manage and pay off their credit card debt, has shut down, according to the company.

In a LinkedIn post that was shared earlier Monday, founder and CEO Jason Brown said the “sad and difficult” decision to close down Tally was not the outcome the company had “hoped for,” but that “after exploring all options,” it was “unable to secure the necessary funding to continue our operations.” According to PitchBook, Tally was last valued at $855 million and had 183 employees. 

Tally’s model was initially designed to help people manage their credit cards and pay off high-interest debt through a lower interest loan that it offered. But in April, Tally announced it would be sunsetting its consumer app and shifting to B2B. At the time, the company said it had a launch partner, a “large publicly-traded consumer company with more than 50 million users,” that was launching in July. However, it never followed up with an announcement naming the company.

TechCrunch has reached out to the company for further details.

Founded in 2015, San Francisco-based Tally had raised $172 million in funding over the years. In October of 2022, Tally raised an $80 million Series D led by Sway Ventures. Andreessen Horowitz led its $50 million Series C round in 2019, which also included participation from Silicon Valley heavy hitters such as Kleiner Perkins, Shasta Ventures, Cowboy Ventures and Sway Ventures. 

Want more fintech news in your inbox? Sign up for TechCrunch Fintech here.

Want to reach out with a tip? Email me at [email protected] or send me a message on Signal at 408.204.3036. You can also send a note to the whole TechCrunch crew at [email protected]. For more secure communications, click here to contact us, which includes SecureDrop (instructions here) and links to encrypted messaging apps.

With $6M in seed funding, Enso plans to bring AI agents to SMBs

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Enso products including email, recruiting and screening, newsletters, media relations and others

Image Credits: Enso

Running a small business means doing more with less. AI agents can help, but building custom agents for specific workflows remains challenging, even with today’s low-code/no-code tools. The idea behind Enso — which came out of stealth by announcing a $6 million seed funding round Tuesday — is to give small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) access to a wide range of preprogrammed AI agents that can handle repetitive tasks.

Founded by Mickey Haslavsky, the co-founder of API development platform RapidAPI, Enso offers industry-specific agents that promise to help customers do anything from managing their search engine optimization efforts to engaging with their Instagram followers, tracking competitors, writing newsletters, managing invoices and optimizing their Amazon stores. Enso pretrains and customizes these agents for about 70 different industries, from accountants to car dealerships, offering more than 1,000 bots in total.

Image Credits: Enso

Haslavsky told TechCrunch that his inspiration for Enso came from his parents, who ran a small music production company and a secondary school. He pointed out that, similar to his earlier venture RapidAPI, Enso is also fundamentally centered around integrations.

“When I started getting into this AI agent space, I realized that, one, if that works, it can bridge the gap [between small and large businesses] because it can be serviceable, because it can give services to smaller businesses on top of other software, and that’s where the integrations come in,” he said. “Second, I realized it doesn’t work. Because you try AI agents today, they’re pretty broken. Three, I realized that, from a business perspective this is just huge, because most of the services that can now be automated cost — as an alternative, if you’re going to an agency — $1,000 a month.”

A lot of the bots that Enso currently offers aim to combine the predictability of traditional workflow automation services, which are dependable but need step-by-step scripting, with the creativity of large language models (LLMs). Haslavsky explained that these bots tend to follow a set sequence of tasks to run a business’ Instagram account, for example. The LLM handles the copy and design, but that workflow is predefined and there is also a traditional scheduler, for example.

Image Credits: Enso

Often, that involves calling on multiple services. Enso offers a podcast agent, for example, that can automatically script podcasts and that then uses ElevenLabs for the text-to-speech part, a music service for the intro and outro, as well as a video service for creating a visual version.

One thing that’s different here is that Enso is taking an à la carte approach where access to every agent costs somewhere between $29 to $79 per month. Haslavsky told me that he decided on this model because most SMBs are constrained on budget and because he wanted to make it extremely easy to buy for them.

The question, of course, is how well those bots work in a real-world scenario — and whether businesses are even willing to turn over some of these functions to AI agents. Typically, there is a human in the loop for things like the podcast and newsletter agents, for example, but if the results are just middling and involve a lot of work to polish them into a product that a business owner would be willing to publish, then a $59+/month subscription (or even multiple subscriptions) may be hard to justify. It might be an easier sell for agents that create reports or manage the SEO voodoo that helps businesses rank better on Google — nobody expects authenticity from those, after all.

In the future, Enso may also offer a marketplace for third-party agents. The team is currently working on low-code/no-code visual tools for building those — but for now they are still focused on the foundational integrations to make that happen.

The company’s $6 million seed round was led by NFX, with participation from a number of angel investors, including Yossi Matias, the head of Google Research, and Shmil Levy, a former GP at Sequoia Capital.

“Small businesses are the backbone of our economy, yet they have passed by the AI revolution,” said Gigi Levy-Weiss, partner at NFX Ventures. “While larger businesses speed by leveraging AI to maximize productivity gains, small businesses struggle to perform the most basic of administrative tasks. Enso is one of the first companies recognizing this need and putting enterprise-grade AI in the hands of emerging companies, democratizing AI by providing access and scalability. We are thrilled to support Enso as it transforms the business landscape and empowers traditional businesses to thrive.”

With $6M in seed funding, Enso plans to bring AI agents to SMBs

by with No Comment Tech

Enso products including email, recruiting and screening, newsletters, media relations and others

Image Credits: Enso

Running a small business means doing more with less. AI agents can help, but building custom agents for specific workflows remains challenging, even with today’s low-code/no-code tools. The idea behind Enso — which came out of stealth by announcing a $6 million seed funding round Tuesday — is to give small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) access to a wide range of preprogrammed AI agents that can handle repetitive tasks.

Founded by Mickey Haslavsky, the co-founder of API development platform RapidAPI, Enso offers industry-specific agents that promise to help customers do anything from managing their search engine optimization efforts to engaging with their Instagram followers, tracking competitors, writing newsletters, managing invoices and optimizing their Amazon stores. Enso pretrains and customizes these agents for about 70 different industries, from accountants to car dealerships, offering more than 1,000 bots in total.

Image Credits: Enso

Haslavsky told TechCrunch that his inspiration for Enso came from his parents, who ran a small music production company and a secondary school. He pointed out that, similar to his earlier venture RapidAPI, Enso is also fundamentally centered around integrations.

“When I started getting into this AI agent space, I realized that, one, if that works, it can bridge the gap [between small and large businesses] because it can be serviceable, because it can give services to smaller businesses on top of other software, and that’s where the integrations come in,” he said. “Second, I realized it doesn’t work. Because you try AI agents today, they’re pretty broken. Three, I realized that, from a business perspective this is just huge, because most of the services that can now be automated cost — as an alternative, if you’re going to an agency — $1,000 a month.”

A lot of the bots that Enso currently offers aim to combine the predictability of traditional workflow automation services, which are dependable but need step-by-step scripting, with the creativity of large language models (LLMs). Haslavsky explained that these bots tend to follow a set sequence of tasks to run a business’ Instagram account, for example. The LLM handles the copy and design, but that workflow is predefined and there is also a traditional scheduler, for example.

Image Credits: Enso

Often, that involves calling on multiple services. Enso offers a podcast agent, for example, that can automatically script podcasts and that then uses ElevenLabs for the text-to-speech part, a music service for the intro and outro, as well as a video service for creating a visual version.

One thing that’s different here is that Enso is taking an à la carte approach where access to every agent costs somewhere between $29 to $79 per month. Haslavsky told me that he decided on this model because most SMBs are constrained on budget and because he wanted to make it extremely easy to buy for them.

The question, of course, is how well those bots work in a real-world scenario — and whether businesses are even willing to turn over some of these functions to AI agents. Typically, there is a human in the loop for things like the podcast and newsletter agents, for example, but if the results are just middling and involve a lot of work to polish them into a product that a business owner would be willing to publish, then a $59+/month subscription (or even multiple subscriptions) may be hard to justify. It might be an easier sell for agents that create reports or manage the SEO voodoo that helps businesses rank better on Google — nobody expects authenticity from those, after all.

In the future, Enso may also offer a marketplace for third-party agents. The team is currently working on low-code/no-code visual tools for building those — but for now they are still focused on the foundational integrations to make that happen.

The company’s $6 million seed round was led by NFX, with participation from a number of angel investors, including Yossi Matias, the head of Google Research, and Shmil Levy, a former GP at Sequoia Capital.

“Small businesses are the backbone of our economy, yet they have passed by the AI revolution,” said Gigi Levy-Weiss, partner at NFX Ventures. “While larger businesses speed by leveraging AI to maximize productivity gains, small businesses struggle to perform the most basic of administrative tasks. Enso is one of the first companies recognizing this need and putting enterprise-grade AI in the hands of emerging companies, democratizing AI by providing access and scalability. We are thrilled to support Enso as it transforms the business landscape and empowers traditional businesses to thrive.”

9 year old child sitting at desk doing homework on computer, homeschooling, self development, motivation, improvement

Parallel gets new funding for its teletherapy platform for kids with special needs

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9 year old child sitting at desk doing homework on computer, homeschooling, self development, motivation, improvement

Image Credits: 10'000 Hours (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Schools in the United States are already struggling with a teacher shortage. For students with thinking and learning differences, it’s even harder to find teachers and other specialists that are equipped to work with them. Parallel Learning is solving that problem with a teletherapy platform that partners with school districts to create individualized plans for each student.

Meant for kids in grades K through 12, Parallel announced today it has raised a new addition of $6.125 million, led by Rethink Impact, a fund that focuses on female and non-binary founders. The funding, which brings the Series A total to $20 million, will be used for expansion into new territories and products. This will entail hiring providers who are licensed in each new state where Parallel will operate.

Founded three years ago in New York City, the startup says that in Q3, it increased its provider network by 200%, with over 95% of providers electing to stay on Parallel. This means Parallel has been able to work with 4x the number of students in almost 80 K-12 school districts, resulting in 4x total revenue generated compared to the previous year.

The services offered by Parallel’s providers include speech-language pathology, specialized instruction, behavioral and mental health coaching and executive function coaching for students. Parallel’s providers work with a school’s special education program (SPED) to develop a Individualized Education Program (IEP), a legal document in the United States that outlines the personalized education plan for a student with special needs.

Parallel’s founder and CEO Diana Heldfond tells TechCrunch that Parallel’s mission is personal for her. When she was seven, Heldfond was diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia.

“I lived firsthand through a number of the same services that we are now providing to students and can personally speak to how impactful the extra support can be,” she says. Heldfond started her career working on Wall Street and, after observing many investments in the developmental services space, spent years developing a thesis around a virtual care provider. Then when the pandemic hit and schools began struggling to serve their students, Heldfond knew it was time to bring her idea to fruition.

One of the main problems Parallel addresses is the shortage of behavioral and special education providers that work with children. “Special education has this tricky issue where everything is lumped together at the district level,” says Heldfond. “Each student gets different services, making it a huge challenge for districts, especially in rural areas. Imagine providers spending hours driving from one school to another. It’s a huge waste of time especially when there’s already a massive shortage of these providers.”

Setting goals

The company’s chief clinical officer is Dr. A. Jordan Wright, a psychologist and co-author of the sixth edition of the “Handbook of Psychological Assessment” and “Essentials of Psychological Tele-Assessment.” Because kids, especially younger one, react differently to teletherapy, Parallel worked with clinical publishers like Pearson and Riverside to incorporate learning materials, interactive games and activities into sessions, which are helpful for kids with shorter attention spans. The platform also includes a library of clinical test materials for speech-language pathologists and school psychologists, and curricula for educators and service providers.

Parallell’s proprietary software also includes partnerships with curriculum publishers who use evidence-based practices. Its Enhanced GoalTracker tool tracks a student’s progress on their IEP and generates individual progress reports, saving time for their special education team.

Once a collaboration plan is created with everyone who is invested in a student’s well-being, including their providers, teachers and family members, Parallel starts with an intake meeting where everyone meets to create a plan. The plan takes into account the strengths of each school district, which is an important part of Parallel’s business model. The company partners with K-12 public school districts, reaching out to special education directors, superintendents and others.

“We offer districts a menu of services, including assessments, speech language therapy, mental health services and specialized instruction,” Heldfond says. “School districts have the flexibility to choose from these core services based on their specific needs.”

One of the ways Parallel is working to prevent burnout among its providers is by encouraging them to form a community with one another, through things like continuous education, mentorship and opportunities to grow within Parallel.

Preventing burnout

“We’ve made it a priority to integrate our providers into the Parallel community and ensure that they get substantial benefits that make Parallel the ideal fit for them. We even have programs that help providers transition from private practice to working in schools,” Heldfond says. She adds that Parallel’s lead-to-provider ratio is 3x lower than its competitors, enabling it to provide more support to providers. Parallel’s workers include both 1099 and W2 employees, who get paid by the hour and work remotely.

Parallel scales up and finds more providers through several ways. One is word-of-mouth: Providers who are already working for Parallel refer their peers. Parallel is also speaking with universities, especially graduate schools, to recruit future providers. It’s also created a library of free resources for both internal and external providers, including professional development materials, free white papers and webinars, in a bid to attract skilled speech-language pathologists, school psychologists, specialized instructors and school social workers.

Parallel also announced five key hires to its leadership team today. They include former GoHealth CTO Cem Veron, who will be Parallel’s chief strategic growth officer; Sarah Finney, who will join as VP as customer success after serving in a similar position at Presence Learning; former Acorn Health SVP of strategic growth Monica Maspons, who will serve at Parallel as VP of strategic operations; Kushal Patel, Parallel’s new VP of finance after working as senior director of strategic finance at Learneo; and Polygon co-founder and CTO Meryll Dindin, who is joining Parallel as its director of data analytics and AI.

In an investor statement, Rethink Impact founder and managing partner Jenny Abramson said, “Parallel’s innovative tech comes at a time when 42 of 50 states face SPED teacher shortages. Our firm spent years looking at solutions in special education and were incredibly impressed by not only the quality of what Diana and her team have built but by the fact that they have so quickly scaled to 80+ districts.”

The TechCrunch+ surveys you need to read ahead of 2024

Woman inside piggy bank with coins

Funding for female founders remained consistent in 2023

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Woman inside piggy bank with coins

Image Credits: Malte Mueller

Female-founded companies in the U.S. raised $44.4 billion out of the $170.59 billion in venture capital allocated last year. Companies with founding teams that are all women raised around $3.1 billion — or 1.8% — which is a dip from $5.1 billion (2.1%) in 2022 and from the $7.3 billion (also 2.1%) raised in 2021’s bull market.

In fact, this is the lowest percentage of venture capital allocated to such teams since 2016, when they picked up 1.6% of all venture funds. There is good news for mixed-gender founding teams, however. Such teams raised 26.1% of all venture capital allocated this year, a sizable jump from the 18.2% they picked up last year. This follows the pattern that women founders still fare better with a male co-founder in the mix.

Kyle Stanford, lead VC analyst at PitchBook, told TechCrunch+ that it’s difficult to pinpoint a single reason why funding to women founders has dipped a bit, but he added that the decline in deal counts for women founders follows the trends of the broader market. Otherwise, he said, data shows there is still a long way to go before the market is seen as equitable.

“Venture has had several tough years, and capital availability in the market has declined significantly. In general, the VC market saw declines of nearly 20% in deal count and 50% in deal value between 2021 and 2023,” he said. “That is not meant to make activity in female-founded companies look better, but the context of market difficulties is important.”

Overall, less than 25% of all deals went to female-founded companies in 2023. The most popular category was software, where around $8.4 billion was invested, followed by B2B, SaaS, and pharmacy and bio. New York City takes the top spot for where women receive the most deals, followed by San Francisco and Los Angeles.

“While it has been a large market for a while, it is beginning to close the gap with the Bay Area in terms of investment count activity,” Stanford said. “New York has become a great market for founders of all types, and right now that is showing through its high VC levels in female-founded companies.”

Women founders can attest that this has not been an easy year for fundraising. Dina Majzoub, the founder of animal healthcare company Vidapaw, started fundraising in October and said investors were hesitant to cut checks. She said that finding money as a woman founder is an uphill battle. “I’ve been asked some things in meetings that my male counterparts wouldn’t blink at,” she said. “One investor even suggested a male co-founder might make Vidapaw more fundable.”

For the most part, she is optimistic for the year to come. She said the landscape for female founders hasn’t radically changed and that women are adapting to play the game better. “While awareness around gender disparities in VC funding has increased, the actual capital flow still lags. It’s a learning curve: Each no is a lesson in relationship-building and navigating a male-dominated arena,” she said. “The funding gap persists, but our resilience and strategic networking are slowly bridging the divide.”

Maya Watson, the co-founder of SaaS startup Manual, spent the entire year raising and is close to finishing her round. She said she didn’t see much traction in the spring but received more inbound toward the end of the year.

Raising in a bear market has had its benefits, though, as investors are paying closer attention to who they are cutting checks to. “I’m excited and hopeful about the companies who are raising in this window,” Watson, who is a first-time founder, said. “I think they’re going to be really solid because the evaluation process feels really thorough and thoughtful.”

Majzoub said she noticed that investors are already more enthusiastic about market conditions this year. “There’s real energy. Investors are getting their pens ready,” she said. “It’s a tougher climb for us women founders, but the view’s starting to look pretty good.”

9 year old child sitting at desk doing homework on computer, homeschooling, self development, motivation, improvement

Parallel gets new funding for its teletherapy platform for kids with special needs

by with No Comment Tech

9 year old child sitting at desk doing homework on computer, homeschooling, self development, motivation, improvement

Image Credits: 10'000 Hours (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Schools in the United States are already struggling with a teacher shortage. For students with thinking and learning differences, it’s even harder to find teachers and other specialists that are equipped to work with them. Parallel Learning is solving that problem with a teletherapy platform that partners with school districts to create individualized plans for each student.

Meant for kids in grades K through 12, Parallel announced today it has raised a new addition of $6.125 million, led by Rethink Impact, a fund that focuses on female and non-binary founders. The funding, which brings the Series A total to $20 million, will be used for expansion into new territories and products. This will entail hiring providers who are licensed in each new state where Parallel will operate.

Founded three years ago in New York City, the startup says that in Q3, it increased its provider network by 200%, with over 95% of providers electing to stay on Parallel. This means Parallel has been able to work with 4x the number of students in almost 80 K-12 school districts, resulting in 4x total revenue generated compared to the previous year.

The services offered by Parallel’s providers include speech-language pathology, specialized instruction, behavioral and mental health coaching and executive function coaching for students. Parallel’s providers work with a school’s special education program (SPED) to develop a Individualized Education Program (IEP), a legal document in the United States that outlines the personalized education plan for a student with special needs.

Parallel’s founder and CEO Diana Heldfond tells TechCrunch that Parallel’s mission is personal for her. When she was seven, Heldfond was diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia.

“I lived firsthand through a number of the same services that we are now providing to students and can personally speak to how impactful the extra support can be,” she says. Heldfond started her career working on Wall Street and, after observing many investments in the developmental services space, spent years developing a thesis around a virtual care provider. Then when the pandemic hit and schools began struggling to serve their students, Heldfond knew it was time to bring her idea to fruition.

One of the main problems Parallel addresses is the shortage of behavioral and special education providers that work with children. “Special education has this tricky issue where everything is lumped together at the district level,” says Heldfond. “Each student gets different services, making it a huge challenge for districts, especially in rural areas. Imagine providers spending hours driving from one school to another. It’s a huge waste of time especially when there’s already a massive shortage of these providers.”

Setting goals

The company’s chief clinical officer is Dr. A. Jordan Wright, a psychologist and co-author of the sixth edition of the “Handbook of Psychological Assessment” and “Essentials of Psychological Tele-Assessment.” Because kids, especially younger one, react differently to teletherapy, Parallel worked with clinical publishers like Pearson and Riverside to incorporate learning materials, interactive games and activities into sessions, which are helpful for kids with shorter attention spans. The platform also includes a library of clinical test materials for speech-language pathologists and school psychologists, and curricula for educators and service providers.

Parallell’s proprietary software also includes partnerships with curriculum publishers who use evidence-based practices. Its Enhanced GoalTracker tool tracks a student’s progress on their IEP and generates individual progress reports, saving time for their special education team.

Once a collaboration plan is created with everyone who is invested in a student’s well-being, including their providers, teachers and family members, Parallel starts with an intake meeting where everyone meets to create a plan. The plan takes into account the strengths of each school district, which is an important part of Parallel’s business model. The company partners with K-12 public school districts, reaching out to special education directors, superintendents and others.

“We offer districts a menu of services, including assessments, speech language therapy, mental health services and specialized instruction,” Heldfond says. “School districts have the flexibility to choose from these core services based on their specific needs.”

One of the ways Parallel is working to prevent burnout among its providers is by encouraging them to form a community with one another, through things like continuous education, mentorship and opportunities to grow within Parallel.

Preventing burnout

“We’ve made it a priority to integrate our providers into the Parallel community and ensure that they get substantial benefits that make Parallel the ideal fit for them. We even have programs that help providers transition from private practice to working in schools,” Heldfond says. She adds that Parallel’s lead-to-provider ratio is 3x lower than its competitors, enabling it to provide more support to providers. Parallel’s workers include both 1099 and W2 employees, who get paid by the hour and work remotely.

Parallel scales up and finds more providers through several ways. One is word-of-mouth: Providers who are already working for Parallel refer their peers. Parallel is also speaking with universities, especially graduate schools, to recruit future providers. It’s also created a library of free resources for both internal and external providers, including professional development materials, free white papers and webinars, in a bid to attract skilled speech-language pathologists, school psychologists, specialized instructors and school social workers.

Parallel also announced five key hires to its leadership team today. They include former GoHealth CTO Cem Veron, who will be Parallel’s chief strategic growth officer; Sarah Finney, who will join as VP as customer success after serving in a similar position at Presence Learning; former Acorn Health SVP of strategic growth Monica Maspons, who will serve at Parallel as VP of strategic operations; Kushal Patel, Parallel’s new VP of finance after working as senior director of strategic finance at Learneo; and Polygon co-founder and CTO Meryll Dindin, who is joining Parallel as its director of data analytics and AI.

In an investor statement, Rethink Impact founder and managing partner Jenny Abramson said, “Parallel’s innovative tech comes at a time when 42 of 50 states face SPED teacher shortages. Our firm spent years looking at solutions in special education and were incredibly impressed by not only the quality of what Diana and her team have built but by the fact that they have so quickly scaled to 80+ districts.”

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