AI startup roundup: Workforce coaching, autonomous machining

Also – NFT marketplace, supply chain platform for SMEs

Every week, AI Business brings you the latest startup news.

From funding rounds to acquisitions, and product launches to partnerships, AI Business covers all things artificial intelligence.

Be sure to check out the deals and products roundup and subscribe to the AI Business newsletter to get content straight to your inbox.

Funding blitz

Startup: CoachHub, a global talent development platform that enables organizations to create personalized, measurable and scalable coaching programs for employees of all levels. It works with brands including Coca-Cola, Toyota, Credit Suisse and Twitter.

Latest funding: $200 million, series C

Lead investors: SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Sofina

Other investors: Molten Ventures, Speedinvest, HV Capital, Signals Venture Capital and Silicon Valley Bank/SVB Capital

Funding plans: Further scale innovation and accelerate global expansion

-

Startup: CloudNC, provider of advanced software that enable factories to autonomously manufacture precision parts

Latest funding: $45 million, series B

Lead investors: Autodesk

Other investors: Lockheed Martin, British Patient Capital, Atomico, Episode 1 Ventures, QVentures

Funding plans: Further develop CloudNC’s AI manufacturing technology

Figure 1:

-

Startup: Magic Eden, an NFT marketplace that reportedly is responsible for 92% of all Solana-based NFT volume

Latest funding: $130 million, series B

Lead investors: Greylock Partners, Electric Capital

Other investors: Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Paradigm

Funding plans: Expand its primary and secondary marketplaces, explore multichain opportunities beyond the Solana blockchain and for product improvement

Figure 2:

-

Startup: Opply, an automated B2B supply chain platform that connects small- and medium-size food and beverage companies with ingredients suppliers

Latest funding: $4 million, seed funding

Lead investors: Chalfen Ventures, Anthemis Group

Other investors: Angel investors from GoCardless, Trouva, Farewill and Jamjar

Funding plans: Build out engineering and commercial teams

-

Startup: fu3e, provider of an adaptive management reporting software for the real estate industry

Latest funding: $4.3 million, seed round

Lead investors: Gresham House Ventures

Funding plans: Accelerate product development, sales and marketing

-

In other news

TrueWealth backs women-led startups

TrueWealth Ventures, an Austin, Texas-based venture fund that backs companies led by women, has raised $35 million for its second fund. The VC firm only invests in seed-stage startups led by women who have proven to financially outperform, in high growth markets of environmental and human health and where women make the vast majority of purchasing decisions.

Their mission bucks the trend in the VC world where less than 2% of funding reportedly went to all-female founding teams in 2021.

In this new fund, TrueWealth plans to invest up to $1 million per startup compared to around $500,000 on average in its first fund.

Echobot merges with Leadfeeder

Echobot, a provider of European sales intelligence, is merging with Leadfeeder, a web visitor intelligence platform. Growth equity firm Great Hill Partners is investing $190.5 million in the merged company to help drive continued product innovation, scale go-to-market capabilities and accelerate growth. Great Hill also committed another $53 million to the combined company to pursue strategic acquisitions.

"It is our goal to be the leading sales intelligence and go-to-market platform to our core European and North American markets,” said Echobot CEO Bastian Karweg in a statement. “We are increasingly seeing organizations looking to take advantage of their own data and third-party data, and then to augment this intelligence with better, more personalized outreach.”