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Friday Fund Day: Startup News From The Southeast For The Week Of August 11-15, 2025

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hypepotamus

15 Aug 2025 — 4 min read

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Funding News

Durham-based Vulcan Elements raised $65 million in Series A funding and announced new production plans for a facility to "reignite U.S. manufacturing" into rare earth magnets. The News & Observer has more details.
GoodShip, a Nashville-based freight orchestration platform for the logistics and transportation industries, raised a $25 million Series B round, led by Tel Aviv-based Greenfield Partners.
Florida-based HealthTech startup Fountain Life raised a $18 million Series B round, led by London, UK-based Eos Venture Partners.
Raleigh's MuukTest (profiled by Hypepotamus in 2021) raised a $3.1 million venture round, per Crunchbase.
HackQuest, a Web3 startup co-founded by Atlanta and Emory entrepreneur Harry Zhang, raised a $4.1 million seed round from Hong Kong-based Animoca Brands.

Investor News

1834 Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm out of New Orleans, announced the launch of its inaugural $20 million fund to invest in startups founded by Tulane University alumni, faculty, and extended community. 1834 Ventures has completed a $4.4 million first close, with 30 investors across 11 states, according to a press release.

Accelerator News

Ten startups gave their 5 minute pitches to a panel of judges on Thursday for a chance to be part of the Fintech South Innovation Challenge. The winner, which will be selected on the Fintech South stage next week, will receive a $25,000 cash award and earn admission into the ATDC Accelerate program.

The startups who pitched included:

In Other News

Alloy, Chattr, NutraSky, RxLogic, Case Status, and Sauna House are just one of dozens of Southeast-based companies that were named to this year's Inc. 5000 list, representing the fastest-growing private companies in America.
Tech Alpharetta will host its first Executive Auction to support the nonprofit and its startup incubator. The auction will run September 1 through September 18, 2025. Participating bidders will have the opportunity to bid for a 1-hour meeting with one of the 25 C-Suite and senior level executives as part of the auction.
Roam, the hospitality-driven coworking and meeting brand, is in expansion mode after opening its 10th location and first free-standing workplace in the Peachtree Corners Town Center.

Recent Events

While Venture Atlanta doesn't officially kick off until October, the organization held a panel event at the law firm of Arnall Golden Gregory in Atlanta this week to discuss funding and branding strategies for women-led startups. On the stage was Lynne Laube, co-founder of Cardlytics and current operating partner at TTV, and Jaimie Clark, Head of Innovation and Venture Strategy at Catalyst by Wellstar.

Southeast Investor Conference (SEIC), which happened earlier this month at ATDC, brought together more than 85 investors from across the Southeast, representing a mix of new and seasoned angels, venture groups, and ecosystem leaders. The program featured 12 seed-stage startups, 10 actively fundraising early-stage companies.

New Names & Faces

We had a chat this week with Eric Brown to learn more about what he is building at inSearchX and its AskOtto platform. Full story will be up on Hypepotamus soon...
Ben Gaskill down in Orlando, Florida is looking to innovate the ice world with an "ice-as-a-service" Bluebox, a newly-launched company. More details on the endeavor here.

People To Know

The team at North Carolina's Front Porch Venture Partners had an informative sit down conversation with Andrew Ashur, CEO of Lucid Bots on their podcast, Taproots. It is worth a listen for anyone interested in robotics and the Charlotte tech ecosystem.