Refinery Ventures closes $36M fund
Refinery Ventures closed its second fund with $36 million, which is two times more than its first fund. Backers included Cintrifuse, Great American Insurance, Western and Southern Insurance and The Cleveland Foundation.
SaaS Capital closes $128M fund
SaaS Capital announced that it has closed its fourth fund with $128 million in limited partner commitments. This fund follows its successful predecessors in pursuing a highly focused strategy, solely serving growth-stage, private, B2B software companies looking for an alternative to dilutive equity capital.
New treatment for mental health disorders
A University of Cincinnati researcher is looking at a potential new treatment for mental health disorders. Ishita Basu, PhD, research assistant professor of neurosurgery at UC’s College of Medicine, intends to show that model-based, targeted electrical brain stimulation can help improve patients’ cognitive control.
GE Aviation steps up SAF research
Engineers and researchers at GE Aviation are developing a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) that is made from different agricultural feedstocks like plant oils, algae, greases, fats, waste streams, alcohols, sugars, captured CO2 and more. While GE Aviation has been researching SAF for a few years, a recent visit by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Thomas Vilsack garnered more attention for this important research.
Contact CI at CES
Virtual Reality lets users experience other worlds using the senses of sight and hearing. Local startup Contact CI is taking that experience to a new human sense: touch. The company, along with its proprietary technology, was on display at this year’s CES in Las Vegas. We interviewed Craig Douglass, the company’s co-founder, last year about the tech and haptic glove they call Maestro.