Audrey Capital is an angel investment and research company created by Matt Mullenweg of WordPress to help innovative ideas grow.

Audrey Capital

Radar Partners is a principal investment firm. The firm invests in early stage technology companies.

Radar Partners

Polaris Partners invests in healthcare and biotechnology companies. Their healthcare portfolio companies' care delivery models include digital health, consumer-centric businesses, patient-provider solutions, data science, and analytics. Their life sciences and biotechnology portfolio companies focus on molecules and platforms, therapeutics, and genomics.

Polaris Partners

Blacksmith Capital provides investment practice on funding companies.

Blacksmith Capital

CNET is an online platform that provides tech product reviews, news, prices, videos, forums, podcasts, how to's, and more. Their global team works 24/7 to explore and explain the changing world. They encourage lively conversation and open exchange of information but reserve the right to respond to and/or delete comments at their discretion. It was launched by Halsey Minor and Shelby Bonnie in 1994.

CNET Networks

The New York Times creates, collects, and distributes news, information, and entertainment through a daily newspaper and a website.The New York Times has more than 50 websites and publishes 18 newspapers, including the [International Herald Tribune](http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/international-herald-tribune) and [The Boston Globe](http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/the-boston-globe). It is a leading media company with 2012 revenues of 1.99 U.S. dollar billion.  The company previously owned [About.com](http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/about-com) but sold it in September 2012 to IAC/InterActiveCorp for 300 U.S. dollar million.  The New York Times newspaper has won 98 Pulitzer Prizes, more than any other newspaper, and it is organized into sections: News, Opinions, Business, Arts, Science, Sports, Style, and Features. The New York Times website is rated as one of the most popular websites online, receiving over 14 million unique visitors in August 2008.  The New York Times is headquartered in New York.

The New York Times

Founded in 2005, True Ventures is a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm that invests in early-stage technology startups. With more than $3.8 billion under management, True provides seed and Series A financing to entrepreneurs in some of today's growing markets.  With more than 40 team members including special advisors, operations professionals, and founders-turned-investors, True represents one of the largest and most experienced teams dedicated to the ecosystem.  The True team believes creativity flourishes when founders are supported fully and empowered to pursue brave ideas. To that end, the True Platform offers programs that inspire professional and personal growth. To date, True has helped more than 350 companies launch and scale their businesses, creating over 85,000 jobs worldwide.  True was awarded Venture Firm of the Year by the National Venture Capital Association in 2018. To learn more, visit www.trueventures.com.

True Ventures

Insight Partners is a global software investor that partners with growth-stage technology and software companies. Insight has a deep focus in Fintech, Cybersecurity, AI/ML, DevOps, and Healthcare sectors. Across their people and their portfolio, they encourage a culture around a core belief growth equals opportunity. As of December 31, 2022, the firm has over $75B in regulatory assets under management. Insight Partners has invested in more than 750 companies worldwide and has seen over 55 portfolio companies achieve an IPO.

Insight Partners

Lowercase Capital is a private equity and venture capital firm specializing in investments in seed/startups, mature, and acquisition of later-stage companies. The firm typically invests in wireless, media, commerce, infrastructure, energy, and transportation sectors. It also advises businesses and funds.  Lowercase Capital was founded in 2010 and is based in New York, New York.

Lowercase Capital

Founded in 2001, Tiger Global Management, LLC (“Tiger Global”) is a New York-based investment firm pursuing a long-term approach to investing in leading, global public and private companies that leverage technological innovation. Tiger Global’s public equity business includes fundamentally oriented long/short, long-focused and crossover strategies, targeting investments in high-quality, public growth companies. The private equity business invests in early through late stage companies that pursue innovative approaches to new and existing industries, building on over 20 years of experience investing in hundreds of businesses in more than 30 countries with more than 90 portfolio company IPOs. With a strong track record investing across sectors and stages, Tiger Global aims to be a thought partner to companies and their management teams across their lifecycle in public and private markets. The Firm’s mission is to generate world-class returns for its investors and to do so in a way that makes its employees, partners and portfolio companies proud.

Tiger Global Management

ICONIQ Capital is a privately-held investment firm that serves some influential families and organizations. The firm is a trusted advisor and thought partner, facilitating meaningful strategic relationships across investment opportunities, family governance, and global impact. ICONIQ provides financial advisory and family office services, and manages direct investments across asset classes, with a specific focus on technology growth equity, venture capital, middle-market buyout, and real estate.

ICONIQ Capital

Salesforce Ventures helps enterprising founders build companies that reinvent the way the world works. Since 2009, they’ve invested in and partnered with more than 400 of the world's tenacious enterprise software companies from seed to IPO, including Airtable, Databricks, DocuSign, Guild Education, Hopin, Monday.com, nCino, Snowflake, Snyk, Stripe, Tanium, and Zoom. Salesforce Ventures leverages decades of expertise in the cloud and long-term relationships with key decision-makers at thousands of businesses around the world to give portfolio companies an unfair advantage, help them build credibility, and accelerate growth.

Salesforce Ventures

Akkadian Ventures is a direct secondary investment firm that focuses on providing liquidity to early employees and investors of venture-backed businesses. It offers tailored solutions for companies and employees, with key benefits that include speed, tax efficiency, and rigorous respect for confidentiality.  The firm was founded in 2010 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

Akkadian Ventures

EBrands is a firm that builds, invests in, and buys companies. Their goal is to increase human efficiency.

eBrands

Savano Capital Partners provides liquidity to private shareholders and support companies through our broad network and capabilities.They focus on working with shareholders of rapidly growing expansion-stage private companies. They are highly flexible in how they work with both shareholders and companies. They create win-win solutions.

Savano Capital Partners

Automattic

The tools that power remote work are define the next generation of enterprise software.

Remote Work Tools

Element (previously known as New Vector) is the flagship collaboration platform for the decentralized Matrix communication network. The platform enables trusted communication in real-time across organizations, with a focus on data sovereignty and security.Element offers both frontend and backend solutions. The frontend includes the Element app for real-time collaboration, while the backend provides self-hosted or fully managed deployments with customizable network configurations and permissions. The platform is built on the open Matrix standard, allowing users to configure networks to suit their specific requirementsIn September 2020, Element acquired Gitter, a developer-focused chat platform to get more developers on board with the open Matrix messaging protocol.&nbsp;Key customers and partnershipsElement's client base includes the French government, Bundeswehr, University of Innsbruck, and Handmade Seattle.Funding and FinancialsElement raised USD 30 million in a Series B funding round led by Protocol Labs in <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/4487">July 2021</a>.The funds were allocated to develop its technology, including investments in its P2P architecture to bypass server requirements and introduce a decentralized voice and video conferencing service.

Distributed workforces require new solutions for office operations, HR, payment, and more.

Remote Work Infrastructure

Plane (previously known as Pilot) is an all-in-one payroll and HR solutions platform targeting organizations that have geographically dispersed operations.Plane offers the following solutions:Core platform: Plane enables organizations to streamline the onboarding process of employees in any country and consolidate their HR data into a centralized platform. The platform facilitates a well-structured onboarding flow with a transparent checklist of onboarding tasks. It also allows for a tailored onboarding experience when organizations expand their workforce to new countries or states and helps with easy communication of offer letters. Plane’s platform enables the storage of data of team members in a central location, while compliance documents are safely stored online with multi-level user permissions in Plane’s SOC 2 compliance platform. In 2024, it expects to release online integration with QuickbooksPayroll: Plane’s payroll provides one payroll system for domestic W2 employees, international employees, and global contractors across 240+ countries. Organizations can hire and run payroll for W2 employees in all 50 US states. It offers the flexibility to run payroll for employees and contractors in different countries at once or segregate them into groups based on factors such as pay period, pay date, or country. Payroll blocks are avoided and employee payment details and statuses can be self-managed. Plane allows funds to be deposited directly into the bank accounts of the global contractors in the currency of their choice, as it offers local currency payments and bank transfers in 70+ countries without the requirement of currency markup or fees.EOR: Organizations can use Plane as their employer of record (EOR) to hire employees in 100+ countries. It will provide advice on country-specific compliance requirements, worker classifications, and other complex HR matters including a 24/5 support system.Benefits: Plane allows organizations to offer benefits such as bonuses, pensions, and insurance to employees and contractors in 175+ countries. It also allows organizations to localize these benefits to meet the requirements of employees of a particular country and ensure that these are compliant with local benefit regulations.Contracts and expense management: Plane provides custom localized templates for contracts, which are double-reviewed by local and US lawyers to ensure that local laws are followed. These are automatically updated to account for changes in laws and responsibilities. With expense management, any team member can submit an expense report, delegate tasks such as approving expenses, and validate through multi-level permissions.Plane offers three pricing plans:US employees plan: Priced at USD 19 per employee, per month. It includes features such as multi-state W2 payroll, complete state registrations online, guided hiring and onboarding workflows, and expense reimbursements.International contractors: Priced at USD 39 per contractor, per month. Its features include payments in 240+ countries, 70+ local currencies, locally compliant contracts, health insurance, and specific tax forms.International employees: Priced at USD 499 per employee, per month. Its features include hiring in 100+ countries, locally compliant contracts, guided hiring, onboarding workflows, and health insurance and other benefits.Plane charges a flat rate with no minimum charges, setup fees, or hidden costs; it can be canceled at any time.Key customers and partnershipsIts notable customers include HelpScout, AngelList, People Path, Tray.io, and Rollbar.Funding and financialsThe company raised USD 6.7 million in a seed funding round in June 2021. Funding utilization remained undisclosed.

Foundation Models

<div>
 
 Liquid AI is an AI research and development firm that focuses on exploring the potential applications of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) to enhance human experiences, particularly in bolstering creative processes across diverse domains.&nbsp;
 
 
 Liquid AI utilizes liquid neural networks, an AI model that facilitates the construction of versatile AI systems. In contrast to conventional GenAI models, liquid neural networks possess smaller sizes, demand less computational power, and display dynamic adaptability to changes. The company has conducted trials demonstrating the efficacy of this technology in autonomous navigation and predictive capabilities across diverse datasets, and Liquid AI is now focusing on commercializing this technology.
 
 
 Recently emerging from a period of stealth mode, Liquid AI has articulated its ambition to construct AI systems empowered by Liquid foundation models. Established by experts in AI and machine learning from MIT's CSAIL, the company aims to surpass existing generative pre-trained Transformers (GPTs). These models prioritize causality, interpretability, and efficiency while demonstrating a commitment to environmental responsibility by diminishing the carbon footprints of foundational models.
 
 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In December 2023, Liquid AI 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24729">
 raised USD 37.6 million
 </a>
 in a two-stage seed funding round. This funding round involved multiple investors, including OSS Capital, PagsGroup, Automattic (WordPress' parent company), Samsung Next, Bold Capital Partners, ISAI Cap Venture, and several angel investors. The funds were earmarked to develop &quot;liquid foundation models&quot; and have a 20-strong workforce by early 2024.
 
 
 
 
 
</div>

Liquid AI is a developer of AI applications that help improve human experience. It focuses on researching and developing tools that use artificial intelligence to improve creative workflows and help clients manage their workflow efficiently.

OFFSITE provides cloud computing and data center solutions.

Offsite operates a platform that provides retreat planning for remote and hybrid teams. The company helps in the planning, management, and follow-up of team retreats, client-facing events, and other transformational, in-person experiences.

BlueLena provides end-to-end audience management and strategic marketing for news media through world-class technology, proven best practices, and deep industry expertise. Founded in 2020, BlueLena is based in Cary, North Carolina, United States.

Titan’s e-mail suite helps businesses to schedule their mails, drop follow-up reminders and provides templates to allow users to quickly send out new emails and recurring responses without having to draft them from scratch.

Element provides services for custom development, prioritised roadmap development, support contracts and commercial products for Matrix. The company enables governments, businesses and individuals to run their own secure communication infrastructure while interconnecting via the global Matrix network. New Vector, a European startup founded in 2017 by the creators of an open, decentralized communications standard called Matrix to drive adoption and grow an ecosystem around an alternative messaging protocol for instant messaging and VoIP apps. The company, which is based in London, England, was set out as a kind of Slack/Discord rival that was a native messaging platform on top of Matrix.

Plane is the #1 easiest-to-use payroll for fast growing teams. We help startups of all shapes and sizes hire anywhere from launch to IPO. Plane supports domestic and international employees with payroll, benefits, and compliance in 100+ countries. We’re SOC 2 compliant and ranked top on G2 for multi-country payroll. Sign up for a demo at https://plane.com/demo

Framework is building people and planet-friendly consumer electronics products that are designed to be easy to upgrade, customize and repair. Their first product is the Framework Laptop 13, which has received an incredible response from the press and consumers (including landing on the cover of TIME's Best Inventions of 2021).  Framework followed this up in 2023 with the Framework Laptop 16, a high-performance notebook delivering deeply customizable inputs and modular, upgradeable graphics.

Castos' podcasting WordPress plugin makes podcasting from your WP site a breeze.  Castos offers an advanced analytics platform gives actual playback data from website listeners. The company was founded in 2017 and based in Orlando, FL.

PeachPay accepts a growing number of payment options, including Stripe, PayPal, Square, Apple Pay, Google Pay, Klarna, Afterpay/Clearpay, Affirm, purchase orders, cash on delivery, checks, bank transfers, ACH debit/credit, and more. PeachPay works with the most major website builders and provides order management capabilities. PeachPay was established in 2020 in Ames, Iowa.

We have been crafting open source software for WordPress for many years now but the whole idea of this project came up in late 2017, when we started working with big Spanish WordPress publishers who wanted to improve the performance of their mobile sites. Despite their best efforts, their WordPress sites on mobile devices were slow and sluggish. We got down to work and developed a mobile WordPress theme for them, called Frontity PRO. Our goal: to make it as performant as possible while delivering a remarkable user experience. To achieve that, we built an internal React framework which used the REST API to fetch the content of their WordPress sites, and spent the whole year optimizing it. We faced a lot of challenges and realized that combining WordPress and React wasn’t easy. But at the end, the theme was a success: it was used by more than 20 million readers and proven ideal for building engaging and modern frontend experiences. In 2019 we decided to use all that knowledge and lessons learnt to launch an open source framework, so anyone who wants to use WordPress as a headless CMS with a React frontend could benefit. We believe that WordPress and React are destined to live together and are committed to helping it happen.

Strattic converts CMS-based websites into serverless versions, making them faster, scalable, and virtually unhackable. It disconnects the dynamic WordPress site from the web and puts it on a different URL behind authentication so only site owners can access that site. Site owners can continue using their WordPress like they always have – marketing people can still add content, owners can still add plugins, and so on. Then, site owners can deploy their site with one click of a button and changes get deployed as a static site with HTML, CSS, and Javascript, essentially the front-end of the site without the underlying vulnerabilities.

Codeable is the only WordPress freelancer platform. We match customers to the best WordPress experts. We help customers solve any WordPress problem.

Our company was ignited by the simple idea that a customer’s own preferences should drive their retail experience. Our ultimate goal is to create a seamless sense of ‘flow’ for your customer as they move from one set of relevant content to another. We obsess over creating the most streamlined, intuitive experience for each and every customer, providing them with only the most personalized recommendations.  We are also passionate about small business and believe that even the smallest store should have access to the same technology the big guys are using. That’s why we created a tool that allows them to get the edge over the competition by plugging into the power of Machine Learning and Big Data technologies.

Pressable is a powerful managed WordPress host owned by the same parent company as WordPress.com, WooCommerce, and WordPress VIP.

WP Engine empowers companies and agencies of all sizes to build, power, manage, and optimize their WordPress websites and applications with confidence. Serving 1.5 million customers across 150+ countries, the global technology company provides premium, enterprise-grade solutions, tools, and services, including specialized platforms for Managed WordPress and Headless WordPress, industry-tailored eCommerce and agency solution suites, and developer-centric tools like Local, Advanced Custom Fields, and more. WP Engine’s innovative technology and industry-leading expertise are why 8% of the web visits a WP Engine-powered site daily. Learn more at wpengine.com.

OwnLocal offers an AI platform that automatically converts offline advertising and other data sources into online marketing campaigns. The OwnLocal platform collects, augments and transforms data into digital marketing campaigns. Best know for their automated online display solution, Origami, OwnLocal products power digital campaigns for over 4000 media companies worldwide, and the private OwnLocal ad network delivers over 10 billion impressions monthly. OwnLocal was founded in 2010 and is based in Austin, Texas.

Automattic Inc. is a technology company focused on developing and providing web-based solutions and services. Known for its robust suite of products, Automattic offers WordPress.com for website creation and management, WooCommerce for e-commerce, Jetpack for site performance and security, and other tools aimed at enhancing web functionality.

<div> Automattic Inc. is a technology company focused on developing and providing web-based solutions and services. Known for its robust suite of products, Automattic offers WordPress.com for website creation and management, WooCommerce for e-commerce, Jetpack for site performance and security, and other tools aimed at enhancing web functionality. </div>

Things Are Not Going Well at Automattic

Giving creators the power of content monetization and audience engagement.

Creator Economy

Platforms that allow creators to share several types of content. Some platforms also offer fan engagement/ interactions with the creative artist via videos/ live streams.

Platforms that offer exclusive content to signed up members.

Platforms that allow creators to share their written works and blogs.

Platforms that provide tools to discover relevant analytics, produce content, engage with the audience, and help with the overall process.

Platforms that allow creators to share one of either videography, live streams, photos, music or audio podcasts with fan engagement capabilities.

Blockchain-based Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) allow creators to transfer ownership of their content via platforms that share proceeds with buyers, sellers, creators, and platforms via smart contracts.

Automattic

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