RENO, Nev.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Filament, a provider of wireless industrial networks, has received $15 million in new venture financing, bringing its total funding to $21.8 million. The new round was led by Verizon Ventures and Bullpen Capital. New investors include Intel Capital, JetBlue Technology Ventures, CME Ventures, Flex technology accelerator program Lab IX, Backstage Capital, and Tappan Hill Ventures. Previous investors Samsung NEXT, Resonant Venture Partners, and Digital Currency Group also participated.
“We have proven there is significant demand for smart, connected, secure IoT solutions among Fortune 1000 companies,” said Filament CEO Allison Clift-Jennings. “This round is all about scaling our offerings from paid pilots to large production-grade installations that impact daily operations.”
Proceeds from the round will be used to scale hardware manufacturing. This financing also allows Filament to:
- Enhance its platform with pinpoint GPS functionality, enabling a new generation of wide-area asset management solutions;
- Grow the platform’s smart contract capabilities, jumpstarting new revenue opportunities for industrial customers; and
- Build out a wider ecosystem of delivery partners, including large technology integrators, value-added resellers, and global industrial conglomerates.
“Filament's technology delivers a uniquely secure and scalable solution for industrial infrastructure where connectivity is intermittent or unavailable,” said Ed Ruth, Director at Verizon Ventures. "We look forward to supporting Filament's growth as the team continues to build the hardware and software foundation for a decentralized IoT."
Filament’s patented network solution will transform the IoT industry with an entirely private and secure application. Filament allows industrial assets to securely communicate with one another wirelessly, independent of cloud connectivity or any other third-party data platform.
"Filament is unique in being focused on the networking layer of Industrial IoT, rather than the Things themselves,” said Duncan Davidson, General Partner, Bullpen Capital. “The Filament layer is not only secure, it makes the ‘things’ trusted and gives them powerful transactional capabilities without relying on the Cloud."
Filament networks are long-range, low-power, and designed to deliver edge processing in environments where cellular connectivity and Wi-Fi are unreliable or unavailable. Filament’s hardware and software is designed to be compatible with legacy and modern systems alike, including multi-vendor solutions.
“At Intel, we believe the future of IoT will be enabled by smart, connected, secure edge-devices that drive a data-based economy,” said Doug Fisher, vice president and general manager of the Software and Services Group at Intel Corporation. “Intel is creating transformative technologies to enable large-scale Industrial IoT deployments, and our investment in Filament will help support that vision.”
Director Patrick Walsh, who led the investment for Intel Capital, is joining Filament’s Board of Directors with this transaction.
“The future of fully-enabled secure machine-to-machine communication in hard-to-connect operational environments like airfields and construction sites is becoming a reality and we want to explore that future with Filament,” said Bonny Simi, president, JetBlue Technology Ventures. “We continue to back innovators that will transform the travel experience, and Filament’s technology has the potential to unlock a new world of smarter, more efficient operations for airlines and beyond.”
Filament’s open technology stack leverages the most advanced communication and security methods available today, and challenges the status quo of entirely cloud-based architectures. The result is a secure foundation for decentralized interaction and exchange. Devices on the Filament platform can discover, communicate, and interact with each other in a fully autonomous and distributed manner.
“CME Ventures is continually supporting technologies that have the potential to impact the markets of the future,” said Rumi Morales, Executive Director, CME Ventures. “We are pleased to invest in Filament, which is pioneering new forms of commerce through its products and applications.”
About Filament
Filament builds hardware and software for the Industrial Internet, allowing companies to securely connect and monitor their assets through long-range wireless networks. Encrypting down to the hardware level and leveraging Blockchain technology, Filament's decentralized network stack allows any device to connect, interact, and transact value independent of a central authority.
Filament has offices in Reno, Denver, Minneapolis and San Francisco. For more information, please visit: http://filament.com/.
About Bullpen Capital
Bullpen Capital is the leader in Post-Seed financing. Founded in 2010, Bullpen was among the first venture capital firms to identify and service the growing gap between Seed and Series A rounds. Bullpen’s portfolio of over 50 investments includes Fanduel, Ipsy, SpotHero, Namely, Classy, and AirMap. Bullpen’s founders previously started over a dozen companies including Electronic Arts, Covad, and Aggregate Knowledge. Prior to Bullpen, the team invested in the first rounds of several companies including Udemy, Tanium, and Zynga.
The team is based in Menlo Park, California and invests in startups around the world. Learn more at www.bullpencapital.com.
About Flex
Flex is the Sketch-to-Scale™ solutions provider that designs, manufactures and distributes Intelligent Products for a Connected World™. With approximately 200,000 professionals across 30 countries, Flex provides innovative design, engineering, manufacturing, real-time supply chain insight and logistics services to companies of all sizes in various industries and end-markets.
For more information, visit flex.com or follow us on Twitter @flexintl. Flex – Live Smarter™
About Intel Capital
Intel Capital, Intel's strategic investment organization, backs innovative startups targeting computing and smart devices, 5G connectivity, cloud, datacenter, artificial intelligence, merged reality, automated driving, the Internet of Things, robotic technologies, immersive entertainment and semiconductor manufacturing. Since 1991, Intel Capital has invested more than US$11.8 billion in 1,473 companies worldwide, and 620 portfolio companies have gone public or been acquired. Through its business development programs, Intel Capital curates thousands of introductions each year between its portfolio executives and Intel's customers and partners in the Global 2000.
For more information on what makes Intel Capital one of the world’s most powerful venture capital firms, visit www.intelcapital.com or follow @Intelcapital.
About JetBlue Technology Ventures
JetBlue Technology Ventures (JTV) incubates, invests in, and partners with early-stage startups at the intersection of technology, travel, and hospitality. As the only corporate venture arm of a US travel provider, JTV identifies and works closely with the most promising technology startups that are relevant to the entire travel experience.
JTV is based in Silicon Valley and serves as the external innovation outpost for JetBlue Airways. Learn more at www.jetblueventures.com.
About Verizon Ventures
Verizon Ventures is the corporate venture capital unit of Verizon (NYSE, Nasdaq: VZ) and invests in promising entrepreneurial companies that are tackling some of today's biggest technology challenges. With a collaborative approach to commercialization, Verizon Ventures is focused on helping companies connect financial resources with strategic, non-investment business functions necessary to deliver successful outcomes. Verizon Ventures partners with companies to help them scale substantively to impact society and lead to new markets. Over the last decade, Verizon Ventures has invested in more than 50 companies covering a range of industries and technologies.
For more information, visit www.verizonventures.com and follow @verizonventures.