Venture Notes - 23 May 2017

Milt Capps

Published May 24, 2017

MCLEAN-based Science Applications International Corp. (NYSE: SAIC) announced Monday its new facility in Cookeville will employ 300 IT workers within three years, bringing its Tennessee total headcount to about 900. The company said the center will be closely allied with Tennessee Technological University, which has strong computer science and cybersecurity programs. The Biz Foundry, a regional startup accelerator that's also aligned with TTU, aims to build a bilateral relationship with SAIC, as well, said Executive Director Jeff Brown.

SAGENTS, the startup led by former Entrepreneur Center EIR LeShane Greenhill, which provides a platform for auto-verification of minority- and women-owned business (MWBE) vendors' statuses, tracks corporate spend, and measures economic impact with MWBEs. Greenhill has enlisted in Village Capital's Fintech 2017 program, which favors startups with finservices for underserved communities and small businesses. Villcap is allied with PayPal on this.

NASHVILLE Capital Network (NCN) and Martin Ventures (MV) are among the latest Mid-South investors betting on HealthIT innovations spawned in other cities. Chicago-based Upfront Healthcare Services (practice management platform) reported May 16 it had raised $4.4MM of its $5.6MM Series A target. MobiHealthNews reported Monday (5/22) the round had been completed. Upfront was co-founded by CEO Ben Albert, who was earlier Founder-CEO of another Martin portfolio company, Care Team Connect (Sold to The Advisory Board Co.). NCN was said to have led the round, supported by MV, Echo Health Ventures and Hyde Park Venture Partners.

Matt King

FCA Venture Partners, the 20-year-old family of funds affiliated with Clayton Associates here, led a $5.5MM Series A in Vericred, which offers a platform with provider-network, formulary and plan data and services to enable individuals and businesses to enroll in, understand and use health-insurance and employee benefits. FCA Co-Managing Partner Matthew King joins the Vericred board. Vericred in 11/2014 announced a $1.1MM Seed financing.

PROCEEDS from Metro Nashville's sale of the old Nashville Convention Center are being used to fund $3MM in grant funding for new affordable-housing innovation and organizational capacity-building proposals. Proposals can involve nonprofit and for-profit groups. Due by June 6.

CHANGE HEALTHCARE gains premier member status and becomes the first Healthcare-sector member among 140 other members of the distributed ledger-oriented Hyperledger Project (HPL), based in San Francisco. Premier members can name a representative to any HPL committee and ChangeHealthcare CTO Aaron Symanski joins the governing board, which operates under a charter from The Linux Foundation. Change recently merged with a McKesson healthIT division, and they adopted the Changed Healthcare name.

► HASHED Health, one of a handful of blockchain and distributed ledger pioneer startups in Tennessee, announced May 4 that the Ann Arbor-based Altarum Institute had joined the company's working group on innovative payment solutions. Hashed Health coverage here.

► NASHVILLE market inroads by GigEconomy apps TAKL, TaskRabbit, Moonlighting, Shipt, Greenpal, Orderup, Uber/Lyft and others are targets for TSN reporter Jamie McGee. Related Brookings story here. VNC