LenderClose and California-based MeridianLink are partnering to integrate LenderClose’s platform with the LoansPQ loan origination platform, LenderClose announced on Tuesday. The integration should streamline lender access to all vendors needed to approve, underwrite and close a mortgage or HELOC loan, LenderClose said.
Entrepreneurship & Startups
November 1, 2018
Iowa-based RosterApps acquired by Ohio software maker ARCOS
Des Moines-based RosterApps, a provider of airline ground crew scheduling software, has been acquired by Ohio company ARCOS LLC, reports Silicon Prairie News. ARCOS will retain RosterApps’ Iowa office and employees. The acquisition will combine RosterApps’ software-as-a-service airline platform with ARCOS resource management to fully automate scheduling, shift-trading, callout and track of flight and ground crew, ARCOS said.
October 31, 2018
BirdDogHR vice president of marketing named to Top Women Leaders in SaaS
Ann Torry, vice president of marketing at Des Moines firm BirdDogHR, has been named to the SaaS (software as a service) Report’s 2018 Top Women Leaders in SaaS, BirdDogHR announced Tuesday. Torry, who joined BirdDogHR in 2013, is one of 50 women named out of more than 3,500 nominations.
October 30, 2018
FUNDED LATELY: Rantizo
Rantizo, Inc.: $500,000, completed in October. Based in Iowa City. Participating: Innova Memphis (Memphis, Tennessee).
October 25, 2018
IDx, Topcon sign exclusive AI platform agreement
Coralville company IDx, the first FDA-cleared autonomous AI diagnostic system, announced a new agreement with ophthalmic device manufacturer TopCon to scale delivery of the IDx diagnostics system for market, reports the Corridor Business Journal. The agreement grants exclusive rights to IDx in the U.S. as the only autonomous AI company permitted to sell products with the Topcon NW400, a robotic fundus camera. In turn, IDx agreed to assign the Topcon
October 24, 2018
FUNDED LATELY: SwineTech
SwineTech: $1.5 million in the company’s second round, completed in June. Participating: AgVentures Alliance, Quake Capital and InnovaMemphis. The June round added eight additional full-time jobs to SwineTech, co-founder/CEO Matthew Rooda confirmed, adding that “a majority” of funding came from Iowa and Minnesota. SwineTech is planning an expansion through North America and into Canada, Rooda told the Business Record, and will be raising another funding round by mid-summer 2019 to
October 18, 2018
2018 Iowa AgTech Accelerator cohort reunites at Borlaug Symposium
Organizers celebrated the Iowa AgTech Accelerator’s second cohort on Tuesday with a little reunion at the 2018 Borlaug Dialogue. Representatives of the accelerator’s five startups pitched their agtech businesses to attendees at the annual Norman E. Borlaug International Symposium, hosted by the World Food Prize Foundation at the Downtown Marriott.“Their focus on global food sustainability is at the core of all of our investor companies, but also at the core of
October 18, 2018
Good Read: 21 percent of Y Combinator female founders say investors have sexually harassed them
BUZZFEED NEWS: More than 20 percent of female founders who responded to a survey from technology accelerator Y Combinator said investors have targeted them with some type of inappropriate sexual behavior, according to results from Y Combinator shared this week. Only 88 out of 384 female founders associated with Y Combinator completed the survey, but the Y Combinator vowed to “ban any investor who acts inappropriately from our community.” IN OTHER
