buzzwords of 2017’s festival was artificial intelligence, such as a discussion held by the general manager of Intel’s Data Center Group, Diane Bryant. Intel has invested in deep learning and AI startups, such as Nervana Systems and Spare5. A few of the startups Intel is working with include Clinc, which was developed at the University of Michigan with a mobile assistant called Finie and is focused on personal banking, and FarmLogs, an Ann Arbor, MI-based startup that raised a $22 million Series C this year to further develop software to help farmers track and manage their operations.
In non-SXSW news, investments are being made, innovators are off to new opportunities, and Austin entrepreneurs are getting more politically active.
—Steve Guengerich, co-founder of China e-retail startup Appconomy and an Austin investor, has announced he’s headed north to lead the University of Texas at Dallas’ Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
—Austin e-retail startup Dosh, which says it gives customers cash back on purchases through in-app offers, has raised $2 million in new seed funding and is preparing to launch out of beta testing. Dosh didn’t want to name its investors but said it has so far raised a total of $6 million. Founders say while shoppers get cash for deals they might otherwise miss, the retailers get that customer data and potential free advertising if a customer shares their deal on social media.
—We’ve been delegating our calculations to the cloud and Michael Henry, co-founder of AI startup Mythic, wants to bring that computing power back down to Earth. The startup, which is based in both San Francisco and Austin, is working on what it calls a novel, speedier computer chip and recently unveiled both its design and the fact that it’s raised $9 million in Series A funding from investors such as DFJ, with assistance from Lux Capital, Data Collective, and AME Cloud Ventures.
—The concept of a “competition for good ideas” works well in business, so why not apply it to politics? That’s the motivation of Austin entrepreneur Joseph Kopser, who is considering running for US Congress in Texas’s 21st district. Kopser, who sold his transportation aggregator app RideScout to Daimler AG in 2014, has increasingly gotten involved in public policy discussions, especially those related to transportation, education, and workforce development. So far, he has raised nearly $55,000 in pledge commitments.
—OutBoundEngine, an Austin startup that makes business development technology, announced Monday that it has formally launched ReadyChat, a web-based live chat service for real estate and mortgage companies, which it had purchased in late 2015.
—Dallas-based Peloton Therapeutics has completed a $22.2 million addition to its Series D investment round, bring its total raised in the round to $74.6 million. Peloton, which was founded in 2010, is developing small molecule cancer therapies, including an effort to target hypoxia-inducible factor-2a, or HIF-2a, in patients with renal cell carcinoma. Investors in the initial Series D raise included Foresite Capital Management, Remeditex, The Column Group, Tichenor Ventures, Topspin Fund, and Nextech Invest.
