VC Breakfast Rundown - Friday in New Orleans
Friday in New Orleans doesn’t rise, it roars. This city doesn’t sleep, it sways, erupts, and breathes fire into every deal, every pitch, every second line cutting through dawn-lit streets. Founders here don’t just hustle, they bleed rhythm, chasing capital like a brass band chasing the beat, relentless and loud. From fried catfish at dawn to grits thick with heat, every courtyard’s alive, every block’s a battlefield where the bold don’t just stand, they scale. These rounds hit heavy, thick like roux, sharp like a snare snap, and fast like the streets they’re born in. No pause, no cool-down. Just pure fuel, pure fire, and no way out but through. Let’s ride.
HelloSky raised $5.5M seed (Caldwell Partners, Hunt Scanlon, Karmel, True Capital). Alex Bates and Hugh Burnham are rebuilding executive search from the ground up, AI that’s 80% faster, 10x better candidates, and already in the black.
Synthetic Design Lab came out of stealth with $20M seed (Playground Global, Godfrey). Daniel Chen and Ramesh Baliga are rewriting cancer therapeutics with SYNTHBODY™, ≥10x faster payload delivery and clinical trials coming in 2026.
Tally raised $8M Series A (AppWorks, Blockchain Capital, 1kx, Placeholder). Dennison Bertram and Rafael Solari are turning DAOs into powerhouses,$81B+ in assets governed. Tally’s full-stack governance is the software layer for on-chain empires.
Bloom Credit pulled $10.5M Series A (Crosslink, Allegis, CT Innovations, Commerce Ventures). Christian Widhalm’s API platform is fixing consumer credit, powering real-time data, rent/utilities reporting, and unlocking the 40% credit invisible.
Exowatt raised $70M ($35M equity from Felicis, $35M debt from HSBC). Hannan Parvizian and Jack Abraham are turning sunlight into 24/7 power with Exowatt P3,90 GWh demand, sub-4 cent kWh, and CO2 cuts measured in megatons.
Instrumentl scored $55M growth (Summit Partners). Gauri Manglik, Angela Braren, and Katharine Corriveau are making grant funding a science, $1B+ raised for clients, $6B+ managed, and they’re doubling revenue without breaking a sweat.
Nourish plated $70M Series B (J.P. Morgan, Atomico, G Squared, Pinegrove). Aidan Dewar, Sam Perkins, and Stephanie Liu turned food into medicine, 3,000+ W-2 dietitians, zero out-of-pocket for 94% of patients, all profit, no fluff.
Grove Biopharma raised $30M Series A (DCVC Bio, Eli Lilly, InVivium).
Geoffrey Duyk, Paul Bertin, and Nathan Gianneschi are cracking the “undruggable,” synthetic, protein-scale Bionic Biologics built to disrupt castrate-resistant prostate cancer and beyond.
Listen Labs closed $27M (Sequoia, Pear VC, Conviction).
Alfred Wahlforss and Florian Juengermann are flipping customer insights at scale, 300K+ AI-driven interviews, 83% close rate, and enterprise clients like Microsoft, SKIMS, and Nestlé.
Omnidian locked $87M Series C (B Capital, BNP Paribas, Citi Impact).
Mark Liffmann and team are guardians of solar, 2GW under protection, tripled revenue, and their final private round before profitability and acquisitions.
Let’s connect and keep the momentum going across the tech ecosystem. Whether you’re a founder shaping the future, a leader driving change, a VC backing bold ideas, or an investor spotting the next big thing—together, we’re pushing boundaries. Proud to be building the future with you.
Let’s connect on LinkedIn and keep the conversation going.