Bloc Ventures is an investment company focused on investments in early-stage Deep Tech companies. Pitch directly to Bloc here: https://blocventures.com/pitching/ Bloc Ventures is not an investment fund, it is a company that invests in early-stage tech companies. Bloc Ventures is very much a company in the traditional sense, with a rigorous focus on governance, costs, and profit, governed by a board of directors with an operational model that enables its stakeholders to focus on building value through a longer-term collaborative and evergreen approach to early-stage tech investing. The company was founded in 2013 and is based in London, England.

Bloc Ventures

YellowDog

A new wave of meat, fish, and poultry alternatives are driving this hyper-growth industry into the mainstream.

Plant-based Meat

UNLIMEAT is the plant-based brand of the South Korean company Zikooin. It produces plant-based Korean BBQ, pulled pork, tuna, and jerky using upcycled grains, oats, and nuts. UNLIMEAT launched in the US initially through the E-commerce platform Wooltari Mall USA. In<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10335"> May 2022</a> the brand launched its plant-based jerky via a Kickstarter campaign which later became available at LA-based Korean BBQ restaurant Jeung Yuk Jeom.In<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/20885"> August 2023</a>, the company added plant-based tuna to its portfolio, marking their entrance into the plant-based seafood category. Later, in<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/24243"> November 2023</a>, UNLIMEAT launched The UNLIMEAT SHOP, an online store to overcome the availability limitations of physical stores in the US and to serve as a platform for a broader consumer connection.Key customers and partnershipsIn<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/12223"> August 2022</a> the company entered into a partnership with Bayerische Fleischerschule Landshut, a renowned charcuterie institute in Germany to develop plant-based pepperoni and mortadella, marking its entry into euro-centric dishes.In<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/18703"> May 2023</a>, UNLIMEAT partnered with the corn dog brand Two Hands to launch vegan Korean-style corn dogs across the US. Later, in<a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/21096"> August 2023</a>, UNLIMEAT partnered with JUST Egg, the plant-based egg brand of Eat JUST to develop Korean-style vegan products.In <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/28714">April 2024</a>, UNLIMEAT partnered with Starbucks Hong Kong to introduce a plant-based pulled pork wrap. Further, in July 2024, it collaborated with Sprouts Farmers Market to launch its plant-based Korean BBQ, bulgogi, and pulled pork products in approximately 400 stores across the US.

With the mission to provide the most effective education for all, QANDA(Mathpresso) operates the world’s leading learning platform, QANDA, an AI-based learning app that allows students of all levels to receive instant answers and customized learning sources. Recognized for its technological advances, QANDA(Mathpresso) was selected as GSV Edtech 150, national representative of Google AI for Social Good APAC event in 2018, and guest speaker at AWS Public Sector Summit ASEAN in 2019. Since 2015, QANDA(Mathpresso) has raised over $105 million in total from investors including SoftBank Ventures Asia, Legend Capital, Mirae Asset Investment, GGV, and Goodwater Capital. Headquartered in Seoul, QANDA(Mathpresso) has offices in Tokyo, Hanoi, Jakarta, and Bangkok.

Unlimeat is a company that produces plant-based meat. Its plant-based meat can be used in a wide range of dishes, ensuring that its plant-based meats are ideal for both Eastern and Western cuisine. It transforms perfectly edible but unloved produce that would otherwise go to waste due to size, blemishes, or cosmetic imperfections into delectable plant-based foods. The company is proud to be a member of the Upcycled Food Association.

Stibee is an internet marketing service company that offers content monetization and A/B testing services.

The.Wave.Talk developed a biosensor that can detect and monitor impurities (bacteria) within a second.  420,000 people die of food-borne disease per year. Moreover, 10 million people will die of antimicrobial resistance by 2050. It's all about bacteria. It is the origin of life and 5 million-trillion-trillion bacteria are living together with us today. Bacteria are everywhere and every-time. Comparing to this, conventional technologies can detect bacteria only with sampling manner. Because they take long time(several hours up-to days) even with expensive tools.

YellowDog enables companies across the globe to accelerate and optimise complex data processes with the most scalable predictive scheduling and orchestration platform for hybrid and multi-cloud management. There are multiple uses of the technology, across multiple industries - from Life Sciences, to Financial Services, to CGI and more. The ideal cloud workflows are those that are elastic, highly parallelisable and distributable. The technology automates the selection of the best source of compute for every workload, delivering new levels of prediction and efficiency in cost and performance optimisation.

<div>YellowDog is a UK-based company that offers an intelligent and predictive scheduling and orchestration platform for hybrid and multi-cloud management.&nbsp;</div>

Building future-ready applications in the cloud

Cloud-native Tech

YellowDog and AMD weigh in on the importance of compute and cloud access

QANDA(Mathpresso)

GGV Capital

KDB Capital

Goodwater Capital

SKS PE

Legend Capital

Mirae Asset Venture Investment

SBVA

Smilegate Investment

Unlimeat

@Ventures

IMM Investment

Primer Sazze Partners

Dt& Investment

Pathfinder H

CRIT Ventures

Producers of plant-based pork alternatives using plant proteins such as pea, soy, wheat, etc. Some startups also use unique ingredients such as mushroom mycelium (whole-cut bacon) and jack fruits (pulled pork) to produce pork alternatives. Products are manufactured mostly in sausage or pulled (pork) form.

Stick Ventures

Stibee

Sopoong Ventures

The Wave Talk

Big Basin Capital

<div>
 
 YellowDog is a UK-based company that offers an intelligent and predictive scheduling and orchestration platform for hybrid and multi-cloud management.&nbsp;
 
 
 
 
 YellowDog Platform provides cloud-native scheduling, intelligent provisioning, and the ability to access computing resources from multiple providers, regions, and machine shapes. YellowDog supports on-premise, public, and private cloud workload management.
 
 
 
 
 YellowDog operates a direct sales model.
 
 
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 
 
 The YellowDog Platform serves over 1,500 customers in various countries. The company serves customers from different sectors, including media and entertainment, financial services, healthcare, and aerospace. Some of its customers are OMass Therapeutics, Rise FX, and InterAx Biotech.
 
 
 
 
 The company has partnered with several cloud companies to enhance its offering, including Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure, and Oracle.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 
 
 As of September 2023, YellowDog&rsquo;s last funding round was in March 2019, when it raised GBP 2.5 million (~USD 3.2 million) in a Series A round led by Bloc Ventures.
 
 
 
</div>

SingleStore is a company that provides a distributed SQL database platform for real-time analytics and operational applications.SingleStore’s platform combines the scalability of NoSQL with the querying capabilities of SQL. It enables organizations to ingest, process, and analyze large volumes of data in real-time, making it ideal for applications that require fast and accurate data processing. SingleStore solves the problem of handling massive amounts of data and delivering real-time insights for use cases such as real-time analytics, operational analytics, and high-velocity transactional applications.SingleStore's competitive advantage is its ability to handle analytical and transactional workloads in a single platform. It allows businesses to consolidate their data infrastructure, simplifying management and reducing operational costs.SingleStore operates with a sales model that includes direct sales and partnerships with technology and solution providers. It offers different pricing and licensing options tailored to the needs of its customers, including subscription-based models.Key customers and partnershipsSingleStore serves some of the largest tech and non-tech enterprises across various industries, including Comcast, Cisco, Akamai Technologies, Fiverr, Goldman Sachs, Sony, Siemens, Hulu.SingleStore partners with all major cloud providers (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, IBM Cloud) and has technology partnerships with Dell, Red Hat, Intel, HP Enterprise, and Looker.Funding and financialsAs of June 2023, SingleStore’s latest fundraising was in October 2022 from a USD 30 million Series F round led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management and Prosperity7 Ventures. The funds were slated to fuel SingleStore’s growth and various strategic initiatives.

SingleStore

Platform9 is an open-distributed cloud company that offers solutions for managing hybrid clouds, Kubernetes, and more. Platform9 offers several products and solutions, including Managed Kubernetes, Managed OpenStack, and Managed Bare Metal.Managed Kubernetes allows businesses to deploy and manage Kubernetes clusters across any infrastructure, while Managed OpenStack offers a simplified way to deploy and manage private clouds. Managed Bare Metal enables businesses to run Kubernetes, OpenStack, and other workloads on dedicated hardware with bare-metal performance.Platform9 claims to deliver a seamless Kubernetes experience across any infrastructure. Platform9's SaaS-managed Kubernetes solution offers a single view to manage Kubernetes clusters running on any cloud or on-premises infrastructure, including bare metal servers, vSphere, and public clouds such as AWS, Google Cloud Platform, and Azure, providing customers with a unified Kubernetes experience. In addition, Platform9 offers automated security patching, on-demand upgrades, self-healing clusters, multi-version support, and audit logging.Platform9 has a subscription-based sales model. It offers its services on a pay-as-you-go basis, with pricing based on the number of managed nodes or instances, with optional add-ons for additional features and support.Key customers and partnershipsPlatform9 targets enterprise customers who run and manage Kubernetes and cloud-native technologies on distributed cloud services, whether on-premises or in the public cloud. Its customers typically include large organizations with complex IT environments, such as financial services, healthcare, technology, and retail companies.As of mid-2022, Platform9 catered to more than 60 enterprise clients and powered 40,000 nodes across private, public, and edge clouds.Platform9 has partnerships with various cloud providers, including Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. Additionally, in <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/32723">August 2024</a>, Platform9 partnered with Fairwinds, a managed Kubernetes-as-a-Service provider, to tackle issues related to Kubernetes over-provisioning and cost management costs in public cloud deployments.

Platform9

<div>
 
 Mirantis is a technology company that provides cloud-native software and services to help businesses modernize their IT infrastructure.&nbsp;
 
 
 Mirantis specializes in open-source software, focusing on Kubernetes, OpenStack, and related technologies. Its core offering is the Mirantis Cloud Native Platform, a managed Kubernetes service that provides a complete set of tools for deploying and managing containerized applications. The platform helps organizations adopt and scale Kubernetes quickly and easily, with features like automated provisioning, integrated monitoring, and self-service access to resources. Mirantis also offers professional services including consulting, training, and support for Kubernetes, OpenStack, and related technologies.
 
 
 Mirantis sells its products and services through a subscription-based model. Customers can choose from various annual subscription plans, depending on their needs.
 
 
 Key customers and partnerships
 
 
 Mirantis focuses on enterprise customers who deploy and manage large-scale private clouds. Some of its high-profile customers include Volkswagen Group, Soci&eacute;t&eacute; G&eacute;n&eacute;rale, S&amp;P Global, Paypal, Volkswagen, and GSK.
 
 
 Mirantis also has technology partnerships with several companies, including Arm, Cisco, Entrust, and Fujitsu, and hardware vendors like Dell EMC, Intel, and Supermicro.
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/22579">
 October 2023
 </a>
 , specialty finance company Horizon Technology Finance provided a USD 35 million venture loan facility to Mirantis, Inc. A sum of USD 20 million was initially funded.
 
</div>

Mirantis

Rafay Systems is a cloud-native platform that automates deployment, life cycle management, and scaling of containerized applications across all cloud infrastructure.Rafay's platform provides enterprises with the tools to deploy and manage containerized applications, microservices, and serverless functions in a scalable and efficient way. The platform provides features including multi-cluster management, automated workload scaling, automated application recovery, and granular application-level access controls. Rafay also provides a Kubernetes-native API gateway that simplifies managing and securing microservices, and includes capabilities to include support for graphics processing unit-based workloads.Additionally, Rafay Systems offers an AI suite to simplify AI application development and deployment. This suite includes pre-configured LLMOps Playgrounds, a turnkey MLOps pipeline, central management of LLM providers and prompts, and AI data source integrations and governance. It also offers a cost optimization suite to help IT professionals manage Kubernetes expenses with dynamic cluster scaling, auto-rightsizing, policy application, and simplified infrastructure.Rafay has a subscription-based sales model and offers its platform as a service. The pricing is based on the number of clusters, nodes per cluster, and the amount of data transferred.Key customers and partnershipsRafay’s target customer segments are enterprises, service providers, and software vendors. Some of its notable clients include Verizon, Equinix, Samsung, Moneygram, and the US Air Force.In 2022, Rafay launched its Technical Alliance Program (TAP), which brings together technology and solutions providers to develop joint solutions to simplify and streamline Kubernetes management and operations. Partners of the program include GitLab Inc., F5 NGINX, MinIO, New Relic, and Sysdig. Meanwhile, Rafay’s public cloud and managed Kubernetes partners include Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and Oracle.

Rafay Systems

Docker, Inc. is a technology company developing productivity tools centered around Docker, a software container platform that automates the deployment of code inside containers.Docker, Inc's major commercial products include Docker Hub, a central repository for containers, and Docker Desktop, a GUI application that enables Windows and Mac users to manage containers.Docker's ease of use, portability, resource efficiency, scalability, and strong ecosystem has made it a popular solution for deploying and managing applications in various environments.Docker has a subscription-based sales model. Docker also collaborates with various channel partners, including technology resellers, system integrators, and value-added distributors to expand its reach.Moreover, Docker has made several strategic acquisitions to enhance its capabilities: AtomicJar (2023), Nestybox (2022), SocketPlane (2015), and Tutum (2015), among others.Key customers and partnershipsAs of December 2022, the platform was used by more than 18 million developers. As of March 2022, the company served more than 56,000 commercial customers, including Adobe, Netflix, PayPal, Verizon, and Target.In <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/27771">March 2024</a>, Docker expanded its partnership with Red Hat to integrate Testcontainers Cloud into the Red Hat OpenShift platform. This partnership aimed to streamline the process of building cloud-native applications and facilitate real-world testing using Docker containers.Funding and financialsIn March 2022, Docker raised USD 105 million in a Series C round led by Bain Capital Ventures at a valuation of USD 2.1 billion. The funds were to accelerate investments in its product and go-to-market initiatives, such as increasing investments in developer productivity, trusted content, and ecosystem partnerships and investing in new channels and geographies.Docker’s annual recurring revenue (ARR) was more than USD 50 million in 2021.

Docker

Vendors offering cloud-native infrastructure or provisioning, which is the first layer in the cloud-native landscape. It encompasses tools to create and harden the foundation of cloud-native apps.

Vendors offering execution environment (runtime) solutions. This encompasses everything a container needs to run in a cloud-native environment, including the code used to start a container.

Vendors offering solutions for application definition and development. This layer focuses on the tools that enable engineers to build cloud-native applications

Vendors offering orchestration and management solutions including tools to handle running and connecting cloud-native applications.

Vendors offering observability, including tools to understand a cloud system from its external outputs, measured by CPU time, memory, disk space, latency, errors, etc.

Vendors that bundle different tools from different layers together into a platform, solving a larger problem. These can include an orchestration tool, a container runtime, service discovery, networking, an API gateway, etc.

Provide tools to design and build applications for deployment and operation in cloud environments

Disruptors are using Generative AI for AI-based assistants and help-bots, while others provide the technology for developing and deploying Gen AI applications and models.

YellowDog

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