Venture Capital and Emerging Companies

HMB would like to congratulate PechaKucha, a social storytelling platform that has been used by millions of people across the globe, and CEO and Co-founder Sean Smyth and the rest of the PechaKucha team on a $2.7 million Seed funding round. PechaKucha, based in Chicago and Tokyo, is a fast-growing storytelling platform used by millions of people across the globe. Content creators, schools,…

HMB would like to congratulate WorkChew and its co-founders, Maisha Burt and Allyson McDougal on a successful funding round. WorkChew, a startup that turns hotels and restaurants into on-demand flexible workspaces, raised $2.5 million. With WorkChew, company employees can access workspaces wherever they are: whether in an urban corridor or a suburb outside of a major city. Membership is often…

HMB congratulates Aeropay, a Chicago-based digital payments platform powering bank transfer payments for businesses, and CEO and Founder Daniel Muller on announcing the closing of a $5+ million venture round. AeroPay is a next-generation payments company, reimagining the way money is moved in exchange for goods and services. Since its founding, AeroPay has operated with the goal of simplifying payments…

HMB congratulates FingerprintJS and its founders, Dan Pinto and Valentin Vasilyev, on closing an $8M Series A financing round. The company, a new kind of toolkit offering a browser fingerprinting service, is based on an open-source project that already has 10 million downloads and 8,000 websites using the service. Fingerprint JS plans to use the capital to expand its fraud prevention…

HMB congratulates client Dina Care, an AI-powered care-at-home platform and network, for successfully closing a $7 million Series A funding round led by Philadelphia-based Osage Venture Partners. Existing investors, strategic partners and Wheaton, Ill.-based First Trust Capital Partners LLC, also participated in the round. Funding will be used to accelerate Dina Care’s development of its industry-leading care coordination platform and…

HMB congratulates FingerprintJS and its founders, Dan Pinto and Valentin Vasilyev, on closing a $4M financing round. The company, a new kind of toolkit offering a browser fingerprinting service, is based on an open-source project that already has 5 million downloads and 8,000 websites using the service. “We have a unique opportunity to disrupt the fraud technology market by enabling our…

HMB congratulates AM Money, also known as Chicago Student Loans, and CEO & Founder Daniel Rogers, on closing a financing round. AM Money fights to give low-income students across the city, state and country every opportunity to graduate from college, find quality employment and build wealth. Google for Startups is one of AM Money's many supporters and has provided additional funding through…

HMB congratulates AeroPay, a Chicago-based alternative payments platform, and CEO & Founder Daniel Muller, on closing a seed round to accelerate its growth led by Continental Investors. The AeroPay platform eliminates traditional payment processing burdens and enables seamless bank-to-bank digital payments between businesses and their customers. The platform is built to work in any environment, both in-person or online. With…

Cohesion, a Chicago-based startup which makes a SaaS platform for building managers, announced that it raised $6.5 million in a funding round led by HPA, with participation from Frasers Property Group, investment firm CMT and a host of individual angel investors. HMB represented Hyde Park Angels (HPA) in their lead investment and congratulates HPA on the closing. HPA's people-first approach…

HMB congratulates client, Red Flag Mania, a game-based investigative experience, and founders Roni Jackson and Kelly Richmond Pope, on their recent partnership with WGU Labs, Inc. ("WGU"). Under the agreement, WGU will make both a service and capital investment in Red Flag Mania, that's innovative e-learning solution combines film, theory and "whodunit" fun to empower learners to use data to…

Foxtrot, a modern convenience store offering in-store and delivery options, announced that it raised $17 million in a funding round co-led by Imaginary Ventures and Wittington Ventures and joined by previous investors Fifth Wall, Lerer Hippeau, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, M3 Ventures, The University of Chicago, Collaborative VC and Wasson Enterprises as well as new investors Bluestein…

Slumberkins, makers of tools for early emotional learning, has secured $2.8 million in its Series Seed funding round led by Listen Ventures and SeaChange Fund. HMB represented Listen Ventures in their investment. Listen Ventures, a consumer-only venture capital firm focused on backing and building the brands of tomorrow, invests in ambitious entrepreneurs who challenge traditional thinking. This capital injection comes…

Leaf Trade, a technology company whose wholesale ordering platform connects licensed cannabis vendors and dispensaries, announced that it raised $4.5 million in a funding round led by HPA and Duke Software Investments. HMB represented Hyde Park Angels (HPA) in their investment. HPA's people-first approach provides unique value to entrepreneurs and investors. HPA will be actively involved in Leaf Trade at…

DataCubes is the first underwriting decisioning platform for commercial property and casualty insurance. Leveraging machine learning and artificial intelligence software, DataCubes provides commercial carriers of all sizes the ability to make real-time underwriting decisions. The intelligence gathered provides efficient, accurate, and productive steps forward for DataCubes' clients. The company was founded in 2016 by Kuldeep Malik and Harish Neelamana and…

HMB represented Ascent in a $19.3 Million Series B Funding Round, led by Drive Capital. Ascent is an AI-driven solution company. Their goal is to help customers automate regulatory compliance by delivering customers regulatory knowledge in the form of a dynamic obligations register. This approach reduces the mundane and error-prone manual efforts of regulatory research and analysis. With Series B…

HMB represented Launchways in a new partnership deal with Patriot Growth Insurance Services, LLC. Launchways, founded in 2009, provides business leaders with human resources consulting, employee benefits and commercial insurance solutions. Launchways has guided over 400 customers to overcome insurance and human resources challenges throughout the Midwest. The company recently moved its headquarters to Chicago to accommodate its growing employee…

Spring 2014 The winter months were unusually cool in late 2013 and early 2014, and most middle market borrowers and lenders will likely concede that lending activity during those months was equally cool.  The optimism for robust deal flow in 2013 never materialized into actual results, even though most middle market lenders remained quite optimistic until the bitter end.  Spring,…

FALL 2013 Although the first half of 2013 was marred by stagnant activity within the middle market lending environment, senior lenders across the middle market seem quite optimistic about finishing the year with a bang.  While it is difficult for senior lenders to pinpoint the exact cause for their optimism, the recurring talking point has been that these senior lenders…