📊 Issue #121: 2024 Mid-Year Stats For Claremont Startups
A look at some of the Claremont startups that raised new rounds of funding, recent Claremont acquisitions and IPOs, and other updates on the Claremont start-up scene for 2024
💬 Welcome to issue #121 of StoryHouse Review
Good morning & happy Thursday. We are halfway through 2024, and the Claremont entrepreneurial ecosystem continues to grow from strength to strength.
This week, we look at some of the standout Claremont financings from the past month, recent Claremont acquisitions and IPOs, and other updates on the Claremont startup scene in 2024. It’s a Claremont world out there. 👇
~ Josh, Miles, Matthew, Pat
📣 Claremont Announcements: LA Claremont Founder & Funder Happy Hour
StoryHouse is co-hosting a Claremont LA Founder & Funder Happy Hour on August 7th in Studio City at the home of Claremont alum Brittany Ruiz, partner at Latham & Watkins. We hope to see you there!
Who: Claremont Colleges alumni founders and investors
What: Light bites, refreshments, and great conversations
When: Wednesday, August 7th; 6pm - 8pm
Where: 11737 Sunshine Terrace. Studio City, CA 91604.
Why: It's a Claremont world
📊 6th Street Stats: 2024 Mid-Year Stats For Claremont Startups
Authors: Josh Tatum & Patrick Go
We are halfway through 2024, and the Claremont entrepreneurial ecosystem continues to grow from strength to strength.
From 2013 to 2023, venture-backed Claremont startups raised over $53B. Over that time period, on average, ~100 companies were founded by Claremont founders per year. Most impressively, since 2011, ~2.6 of those ~100 companies founded per year have eventually exceeded $1B in valuations, acquisitions, or IPOs.
2024 looks to be another year of strength and growth for the Claremont ecosystem.
Already in 2024, 60 new startups were founded by Claremont founders, and in total, Claremont startups have raised over $2.7B.
Here’s a quick look at some of the exciting Claremont financings just this past month:
Headway: The mental health unicorn, originally co-founded by Daniel Ross (PO ‘11), raised a new funding round valuing the company at $2.3B, roughly doubling its $1B valuation from a year earlier. Spark Capital led the $100M funding round. Headway connects users with therapists and handles administrative tasks, serving over 33,000 providers across all 50 states. Dan is currently the new co-founder of StoryHouse portfolio company Marble Health.
Read More…Ohmium International: The unicorn company completed another round of funding from its strategic partner, 3M. Ohmium is a leader in green hydrogen production and was founded by CEO Arne Ballantine (HMC ‘90). Their Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) electrolyzers are at the forefront of cost-effective green hydrogen generation and help customers achieve sustainable energy goals for industrial, transportation, and energy projects. Ohmium also raised a $250M Series C round led by TPG Rise Climate last year, which valued the company well over $1B.
Read More…ImmuneAGE Bio: ImmuneAGE Bio, founded by serial entrepreneur and CEO Sebastian Brunemeier (PI), announced their $2M seed round as they build the first drug discovery platform to rejuvenate the entire immune system at the source: the hematopoietic stem cell (HSCs) residing in the bone marrow. The company is developing therapies aimed at boosting immune function and enhancing recovery from chemotherapy.
Read More…Endless Health: This Austin-based company, which specializes in at-home testing and preventive medicine, raised $4.5M in seed funding from Next Coast Ventures, StoryHouse Ventures, Asset Management Ventures, Antler Elevate, and other top institutions. Endless Health, co-founded by CEO Cooper Galvin (PO ‘14), is expanding its operations and developing tools to support life sciences research and evidence-based prevention programs.
Read More…Uplimit: The AI-powered learning platform, co-founded by CEO Julia Stiglitz (PO), secured an $11M Series A funding led by Salesforce Ventures. The funding will enable Uplimit to expand its enterprise platform, enhancing its AI-driven learning solutions to upskill organizations and employees more effectively for the evolving workplace.
Read More…
In addition to successfully raising over $2.7B in completed financings in 2024, Claremont startups have also had total IPO and acquisition exit amounts of over $2B. So far, in 2024, eight different Claremont startups have been acquired, and one has IPO’d:
Alumis: The precision medicine company is now public and trading on the Nasdaq with a $600M+ market cap. Alumis, founded by physician-scientist June Lee (PO), focuses on autoimmune disorders and is leveraging its advanced analytics and drug discovery platform to develop innovative treatments. Previously, June was also instrumental in building MyoKardia, which was acquired by Bristol Myers Squibb for $13B.
Read more…Curated: The online shopping service company was acquired by social commerce platform Flip for $330M. Co-founded by COO Peter Ombres (CMC ’04), Curated connects consumers with experts for personalized advice on high-value purchases. Prior to the acquisition, Curated raised money from top investors like Forerunner, Greylock, and CapitalG.
Read More…
2024 is only halfway through, and the Claremont ecosystem continues to grow and take its place among the most entrepreneurial universities in the world. It’s definitely a Claremont world out there!
Read more about other recent Claremont financings in the full article below.👇
💼 Who’s Hiring?: Parakeet Health & Marble Health
Jung Park (HMC ‘89) is the CEO and co-founder of Parakeet Health, an AI voice answering service for healthcare practices that automates repetitive phone tasks like appointment scheduling, billing, and general inquiries using GenAI. Parakeet’s founding team includes seasoned healthcare industry veterans (One Medical IPO, Doximity IPO, Epocrates IPO) and skilled technology leaders (Microsoft, Twitter, Rippling, PrimerAI). They are backed by top-tier VCs, including StoryHouse, Canvas Ventures, and CoFound Partners. Parakeet is looking for a Founding Software Engineer to join their growing team.
Daniel Ross (PO ‘11) and Jake Sussman are the co-founders of the mental health startup Marble Health. Having emerged from stealth and with their recent $5M seed round, Marble is on a mission to massively increase access to timely, preventative care for all kids early in their mental health journey. They are backed by top institutions, such as StoryHouse, Khosla, Town Hall, and IA Ventures. Dan and Jake are looking for early employees to join their founding team:
Check out the other ~5,000 open jobs at 400+ Claremont-affiliated companies here on our Storyboard. Plus, create a profile and enter your preferences to get alerted to new job postings relevant to you, be they the 1,000+ remote jobs, 100+ internships, or 40+ part-time positions available. We’ve published research that shows that Claremont-founded companies that disproportionately hire Claremont talent outperform — so pay attention, Claremonsters!
If any of these roles catch your eye 👀 , apply and mention StoryHouse Review. Or, if you are an employer looking to hire tip-top Claremont talent, fill out this form to have your jobs featured.
🗣️ Conversations on the Interwebz:
This week’s top read 🔥
Claremont alum and VC Scott Kosch (CMC ‘93) wrote an article discussing how private capital funds are using AI to transform deal sourcing, analysis, and portfolio management. In his article, he highlights how this technology is reshaping the investment landscape and enhancing returns. Scott is the Managing Partner of VC firm Kosch Capital and a Senior Partner at NextAccess, an advisory firm of highly experienced sales and marketing experts and AI practitioners.
This week’s Claremont financing event 💸
Blue Owl Capital recently acquired Atalaya Capital Management for $450M. Atalaya is an established alternative credit management business with an 18-year track record. The company focuses primarily on asset-based credit investments in consumer and commercial finance, corporate, and real estate assets and has managed over $10B of AUM as of June 30, 2024. Claremont alum Ivan Zinn (CMC ‘96) is the founder and CIO of Atalaya.
This week’s top listens 🎧
Claremont grad Semira Nikou (SC ‘09) was on the Sanctions+ podcast, where she shared her journey to becoming an entrepreneur and her views on facing adversity, overcoming personal challenges, and raising capital for a start-up. Semira is the co-founder and CEO of Better Sour, a gummy candy manufacturer that raised an oversubscribed $1M pre-seed round last year.
Social Cipher co-founder and CEO Vanessa Castañeda Gill (CMC ‘18) joined Joshua Stamper on the Aspire to Lead podcast to discuss the transformative power of play and fandom culture in the classroom. Vanessa also shared updates on the collaboration between Social Cipher and The LEGO Foundation, which aims to support students through play. Social Cipher is a game-based social-emotional learning platform for neurodiverse youth and the professionals who work with them.
Everything else you need to know💡
Claremont grad Jamil Karriem (PO ‘12) is the founder and CEO of Hiki, the first-ever social ecosystem built by and for the Neurodivergent community. Recently, Forbes interviewed Jamil about their pivotal expansion. He explained Hiki’s decision to be inclusive of all neurodivergent people and how the app’s origins in catering to autistic adults helped his team engage in more conversations with the broader neurodivergent community.
Claremont alum Kurt House (CMC ‘01) and his AI-driven mining company, KoBold Metals, were featured by The New York Times for discovering a potential world-class copper deposit in Zambia. This find, which could transform global mining with billions in annual copper production, highlights KoBold's impact on the mining industry. Backed by notable investors like Bill Gates's Breakthrough Energy Ventures and a16z, KoBold is one of the 20 current privately held Claremont unicorn companies.
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🍽️ BTL Snacks:
🔐 AI And Data Security For Brokers….. As AI reshapes the insurance industry, brokers increasingly adopt AI tools to reduce manual work and better help clients. However, when working with sensitive client data, security and privacy are top priorities. In his recent article, Claremont grad Aman Raghuvanshi (CMC ‘18) shared three approaches to ensuring data security when implementing AI solutions in your brokerage: on-premise deployments, VPC deployments, and secure multi-tenant applications. Aman is the co-founder and CEO of AI automation startup Pyq AI.
🫡 From Post-Grad Upstart To CEO….. Goldman Sachs recently shared their Q&A with Claremont entrepreneur and AI expert Ben Colman (CMC). In this interview, Ben talked about how his previous startup, PlaceAVote, led to a cross-functional role in GS. He also shared the lessons he learned in his time at GS that helped him be successful in the next phases of his career. Currently, Ben is the co-founder and CEO of Reality Defender, an award-winning deepfake detection company that helps organizations identify AI-generated and manipulated content across audio, video, images, and text.
🧑💻 The Intricacies Of Software Vendor Selection….. Claremont alum Louis-Victor Jadavji (CMC) shared his insights with ITDirector.io on navigating the complexities of enterprise software selection. He emphasized the need for thorough vendor evaluations, warned about pitfalls like poor discovery phases and hidden limitations, and highlighted how AI is transforming tech assessments. He also offered practical advice for IT leaders to streamline decisions and future-proof their tech stacks. LV is the co-founder and CEO of the technology vendor insights platform Taloflow.
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