Startup Monday

Ballston startup PerformYard to expand after nabbing $95M investment

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Ballston-based human resources startup PerformYard has nabbed a $95 million equity investment from Updata Partners, a D.C.-based growth equity firm.

PerformYard, which offers companies employee performance management software that handles everything from annual reviews to quarterly goals, announced the investment earlier this month.

The investment from Updata, which invests in business-to-business software-driven companies, caps off other recent windfalls for PerformYard. Its revenue grew by five times over the last four years, launched a new product last summer and, last spring, was ranked first in the category of “Highest Satisfaction Software” by G2, a peer-to-peer review site.

Now, bolstered by the $95 million investment, PerformYard intends to hire more staff across all departments. Right now, it has eight full-time positions open, per its website.

“We are thrilled to partner with Updata as we embark on our next phase of growth in solving performance management challenges,” PerformYard Founder and CEO Ben Hastings said in a statement. “Given the incredible success and growth our team has realized in recent years, I view this partnership as a natural evolution of our business to support continued development and expansion.”

PerformYard logo (via PerformYard/Facebook)

Hastings founded PerformYard in 2013 to help organizations improve employee performance through better management and improvements to standard practices within human resources, such as performance reviews. For instance, notes PerformYard, 93% of organizations run employee performance reviews but almost the same percentage of HR leaders, 90%, are unhappy with their process.

“We identified a critical need for employers to better manage, coach, retain and progress talent throughout their organizations,” Hastings said. “Over the last 10 years, we have seen the emphasis on employee performance and engagement deepen significantly. Our plan is to continue building our organization to support these critical initiatives.”

Updata General Partner Carter Griffin, who will join PerformYard’s Board of Directors, complimented Hastings and the PerformYard team for its exceptional performance in recent years.

“With PerformYard, we see an opportunity to win in a large and important category,” he said in a statement. “We are excited to help further scale the company.”

Photo via PerformYard/Facebook

Fresh Impact Farms reaps benefits of more farming space with eye toward expanding in the coming years

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

One of Arlington’s only urban farms, Fresh Impact Farms, is continuing to enjoy success catering to the taste buds of high-end D.C. restaurants, from Seven Reasons to Oyster, Oyster.

Founded in 2017, the urban agriculture startup in a strip mall on Langston Blvd has experienced significant growth in the last year. With support from a state grant, it doubled the size of its indoor farm and began reaping the benefits of this expansion last year, says founder Ryan Pierce. As a result, its sales grew rapidly in 2023 — a pattern Pierce says he hopes to continue going into 2024.

“If 2024 goes as well as we hope it’s going to go, we’ll start looking for additional expansion space, with the goal of staying here in Arlington,” he said. “We have rather unique needs for real estate… [and Arlington] keeps us really close to our primary clientele.”

That has been and always will be D.C.’s pioneering chefs in the fine dining scene, who Pierce says are “the first movers in terms of new trends in food.”

This drives Fresh Impact Farms to keep trying out dozens of new and uncommon varieties of edible succulents and herbs as well as different color combinations of rare, edible flowers. Overall, the farm is home to well over 400 varieties of crops, he said.

Fresh Impact Farms growing area in a strip mall on Langston Blvd (courtesy photo)

“We’re always introducing new products,” Pierce said. “That’s something they expect. They’re always asking us, ‘What’s new? What can we get from you that we couldn’t get from you in the summer?’ Half of our job is finding out what we should be growing and then our team has to figure out how to grow it.”

Pushing the boundaries of edible plants requires highly skilled staff, he noted.

Fresh Impact Farms is taking a more modest, or cautious, approach to growth when it comes to adding clients — too many would strain his farm’s production levels — and incorporating new tech.

“There’s always the initial push to make everything as complicated as possible and get as much tech into the farm as possible,” Pierce said. “What we’ve found is that sometimes, the human approach works better. While we automate watering, lighting and climate control, we don’t automate harvest or seeding. For those, we’ve found, it’s better to have a human touch.”

Beyond Fresh Impact Farms, Arlington has one other urban farm, Area 2 Farms, located in a brick industrial building in Green Valley. While neither is in an office building, Arlington County has taken steps to make it easier for urban farmers to begin growing plants in vacant, underused and outdated office spaces by loosening its zoning restrictions.

Like the county, Pierce — who sits on Arlington’s Industrial Development Authority — says he is constantly thinking about how Arlington can fill its office space. Upfront building conversion costs, however, might make it difficult for more farms to take advantage of these looser zoning rules.

“How do you adjust the centralized HVAC to accommodate plants over people? While the temperature and humidity is about the same you’d want it in your house, the systems in which you do that are completely different. It’s a much different challenge than someone people realize,” he said.

The county has to attract new talent and to its credit, is doing so via its Innovation Fund, he said.

“As far as putting farms, that’s a real big challenge,” he said. “Ultimately, it’s one of those things where I want to look for solutions but it doesn’t mean my business is the solution for that particular problem.”

Courthouse-based company improving website accessibility for people with disabilities acquires Israeli startup

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

A Courthouse-based company that aims to make websites more accessible has acquired another company in a deal valued at $99 million.

The deal between Level Access, of Arlington, and UserWay, a 7-year-old Israeli digital accessibility startup that went public on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange last year, was announced last week. The Times of Israel reported Level Access is paying $98.7 million to UserWay shareholders as part of a cash deal.

Founded 25 years ago by CEO Tim Springer, Level Access works to improve digital accessibility for people with disabilities by helping companies comply with an increasing number of regulations surrounding the accessibility of websites, smartphone apps and other digital experiences.

The acquisition of UserWay is the second such business maneuver in two years for Level Access, which merged with Toronto-based eSSENTIAL Accessibility in 2022.

Springer, who says he has spent and his entire career in accessibility, outlined in a lengthy LinkedIn post how incorporating the technology solutions UserWay offers will help Level Access realize improve accessibility across the digital landscape.

UserWay uses automation to make websites more accessible through the use of “overlays” — the same technology used to add pop-up cookie consent tools to virtually every website. These coding scripts automatically fix common accessibility issues and change the appearance and structure of a page to function better for people with disabilities, per Springer’s post.

Level Access CEO Tim Springer (courtesy photo)

The accessibility community, however, has historically criticized overlays for falsely promising a quick, easy, one-size-fits-all solution, he said.

Despite these misgivings, Springer says he has watched this controversial technology grow over the last two decades and today considers it “an amazing part of an overall solution for accessibility.”

“If we’re thoughtful and deliberate in their use — implementing overlays in an ethical fashion — we will drastically accelerate the timeline for the creation of an accessible digital world,” Springer said in his LinkedIn post. “We can remain mired in historical biases against these technologies or use them to accelerate the cause of accessibility. We choose the latter.”

The technology would be especially helpful for smaller website owners who do not have the funds or technical expertise to develop a comprehensive digital accessibility program, he said.

“Level Access can either provide a principled, compelling, cost-effective solution they can say ‘yes’ to today, and get started on accessibility, or keep doing little for these firms,” he said. “If we’re smart about it, that starting point will materially improve the accessibility of these sites today. Now. Not in ten years when they’re big enough to do it ‘right.’ Not when we’ve exhausted their desire to do the right thing with an approach they can’t take on.”

While the digital accessibility industry has seen many technologies come and go — some that worked and some that did not — the need for automated solutions is here to stay, Springer said.

“Millions of websites rely on automated remediation technology today, so this is clearly a requirement the market is demanding,” he said. “We’re excited to play a role in bringing that technology to organizations around the world in an effective, impactful fashion.”

A Yorktown alum sold his first startup before he had a diploma. Now he’s onto the next venture.

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

By the time Arlington native Roger Nowakowski graduated from Yorktown High School, he had already founded and sold his first startup venture.

Nowakowski, who grew up in the Woodmont neighborhood, built an app for people trying to get their hands on the next hot product in the luxury goods market — especially sneakerheads. He founded it at 16, as a high school sophomore when he was stuck at home at the height of the pandemic.

Limited-edition shoes from brands such as Nike and Adidas sell out online within seconds, which he says made it borderline impossible for a human to manually buy the product. His app allowed users to, for instance, purchase a single pair or mass quantities of shoes at the press of a button.

“Sneaker resellers would use my product to buy these hyped sneakers on drop in mass, to then sell on the aftermarket for profit,” he said noting, sneakers can sometimes sell at 10 times their retail price on the aftermarket.

Some 1,500 paying users made more than $1.4 million in purchases through the app before he sold it in 2021, when he was 17 years old. He graduated from Yorktown a year later and went straight into coding for other projects.

“I felt more alive than ever through the pursuit of knowledge out of genuine curiosity in areas I was passionate about,” he said. “After exiting from my first project, I was extremely eager to get back to work.”

For the next two years, he would work with a Miami-based team on a blockchain app for music artists. Now, he is a founding engineer at Waves, a venture capital-backed platform connecting brands looking to advertise with social media influencers.

It launched on the App Store this September, the Denver Business Journal reported.

From left: Josh Jacobs, Allison Swope, Bruce Weaver, Roger Nowakowski and Justin Schwartz (courtesy photo)

“I was the first engineer and employee hire,” said Nowakowski. A colleague referred him to the founder of Waves, Bruce Weaver, when the platform was just an idea.

Typically, brands select leading influencers to make paid promotional posts to market their products. Waves allows people with smaller Instagram and TikTok followings to buy products from participating brands — at a discount — if they make promotional content within two weeks. Brands then pay creators based on how well this content does.

Waves is poised for significant growth next year, Nowakowski said.

“We’re setting ambitious milestones; 100,000 creators and processing over $1 million in total creator payouts,” he said. “We want to expand the creator economy while delivering unparalleled returns on ad spend for brands leveraging [user-generated content].”

Nowakowski credits his computer science teacher at Yorktown for helping him launch his first app — and thus, his career.

“At the time, Mr. [Greg] Rusk made an effort to align what we were learning in [computer science] with what I was building personally,” he said. “Not only was he a great teacher, but given his experience building software, he was easily relatable to, and guided me on the right path in class.”

(more…)

Arlington-based WireWheel acquired by Texas data privacy company

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Arlington-based WireWheel has been acquired by Osano, a data privacy management company out of Austin, Texas.

Osano, which aims to simplify the process of building and managing data privacy programs for companies, is not disclosing the financial terms of the acquisition.

A majority of WireWheel’s employees are joining Osano, though some employees weren’t offered new roles because of redundancies between the businesses, a spokeswoman told ARLnow.

Other top brass, including its founder Justin Antonipillai — the former Acting Undersecretary of Economic Affairs at the U.S. Department of Commerce under President Barack Obama — will not continue with Osano, either.

“The founders will not be staying on as part of the acquisition,” the Osano spokeswoman said. “However, WireWheel’s head of Data Privacy will be joining Osano’s customer facing teams to help our customers successfully implement our solutions.”

WireWheel declined to comment for this story and deferred to Osano CEO Arlo Gilbert.

Founded in 2016, the Courthouse-based startup provides companies with privacy assessment tools to keep up with the ever-evolving regulatory environment surrounding data privacy, which varies greatly by country and state.

These platforms show customers what data they collect on customers and how that data is used, while allowing customers the ability to access or delete this data or indicate they do not want it sold. Two years ago, the startup raised some $200 million to speed up its go-to-market plans and market its products to small and mid-sized companies.

Banner announcing Osano has acquired WireWheel (via Osano/Facebook)

Gilbert, Osano’s CEO, says this is the first of an expected 12 acquisitions in the coming 18 months, involving $100 million, to transform the data privacy market.

“This acquisition is high-impact for Osano and WireWheel’s customers because the two companies’ solutions complement one another so well,” Gilbert said in a statement. “Adding WireWheel’s technology to our platform delivers major advantages for enterprise customers, who will benefit from the scalability, customizability, customer experience and advanced features that address the needs of deploying data privacy programs at scale.”

The Courthouse startup’s tools will also give Osano clients extra confidence while pursuing AI initiatives, per the press release.

Companies that train AI models with large data sets have to ensure the data is free of personal information. Inadvertently including private information in these sets is a costly mistake, as these expensive AI models then have to be destroyed.

Arlington cookie company MOLTN expands into Ashburn and heralds more locations and changes next year

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that spotlights Arlington-based startups, founders, and local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Arlington-based cookie company MOLTN Cookies opened its newest location today (Monday) in Ashburn, just in time for National Cookie Day.

To celebrate, the new location in a pizza and pasta place called EATaliano will offer free triple chocolate cookies — limited to one per visitor, while supplies last — from 4-6 p.m.

Customers who splurge and put in orders exceeding $75, meanwhile, will get a free sugar or s’mores cookie-scented candle.

“We only have 20, so grab them quick,” the company says on Instagram. “We can’t wait to celebrate together.”

MOLTN’s cookie-scented candles (courtesy photo)

The location started operating two months behind its anticipated opening date of Oct. 1.

It is MOLTN’s third in the D.C. area, after the company debuted in a “ghost kitchen” within AllSpice Catering at 6017 Wilson Blvd, near the border with Falls Church. Over the summer, it expanded into D.C., operating from Teddy & The Bully Bar at 1200 19th Street NW.

The Ashburn cooke hub kicks off what MOLTN founder Neal Miglani says is the start of an expansion across the D.C. area., including three forthcoming locations in Maryland: Prince George’s and Montgomery counties and Baltimore.

“We are thrilled to bring the MOLTN Cookies brand to Ashburn and beyond,” Miglani said in a statement. “The excitement around our new location at Eataliano signals the start of an even more exciting phase for us as we plan to expand across the DMV area. Soon, more communities will be able to enjoy the MOLTN Cookies experience.”

He told ARLnow he aims to open 10 new locations by the second quarter of 2024, in the D.C. and Baltimore areas.

He aims these locations to soon bake the 12,000-15,0000 cookies MOLTN’s Arlington location churns out each month.

The company transitioned from operating ghost kitchens to what Miglani says is a licensing model. Restaurant partners purchase MOLTN’s cookie dough from approved suppliers in its distribution network.

“We provide the dough and all technology, they handle the operations and retain all profits, a strategy that propels rapid expansion while upholding the excellence MOLTN Cookies is known for,” Miglani says.

MOLTN cookies (courtesy photo)

Other new ventures are coming down the pike, too.

Miglani says MOLTN is creating a gifting platform that allows customers to send freshly baked, warm cookies to others, along with personalized items such as candles and cards. The company is on the cusp of launching nationwide shipping.

These developments could be coming late in the first quarter of next year or early in the second quarter, Miglani said.

Arlington-based Federated Wireless to research securing 5G networks wherever U.S. military may go

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Ballston-based Federated Wireless is working with a university to secure 5G networks for U.S. soldiers and government operatives while abroad in possibly hostile countries.

It aims to develop a product that can secure 5G networks all over the world — even networks that are deployed by “potentially adversarial nations,” according to a press release.

That way, Americans abroad, whether in the military or part of a non-governmental organization, can use these networks without risking critical information falling into the hands of bad actors.

“The goal of the work is to ensure a range of users, from U.S. soldiers to commercial enterprises, can use 5G cellular networks in other countries, without those countries being able to extract valuable operational information,” Federated Wireless Chief Technology Officer Kurt Schaubach said in a statement.

Federated Wireless was selected to be the business partner for researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder leading the 2-year project, dubbed 5G Hidden Operations through Securing Traffic, or GHOST.

GHOST will explore disguising and anonymizing user identities, locations and traffic to prevent surveillance and analysis by hostile parties, the release said.

“This work is important for the United States because it inherently is about keeping our people safe,” said Eric Keller, a project researcher and CU Boulder associate professor, in a press release. “I’ve had the great fortune of being able to advise students at CU Boulder who were in the military, and hearing stories of situations they’ve been in really hits home the impact that GHOST could help keep them safer.”

The GHOST team (courtesy Federated Wireless)

The university and Federated Wireless recently received a $5 million grant from the National Science Foundation for the project.

The duo received a $750,000 NSF grant in September 2022 to fund the initial development of the technology. The $5 million grant will fund further work to develop a single prototype. At the end of the project, Federated Wireless and the university will decide what makes sense to commercialize.

“We’re excited to see where the research leads,” a spokeswoman for Federated Wireless told ARLnow.

Lead CU Boulder researcher Keith Gremban says Federated Wireless is the right partner for the project because it will provide valuable communications expertise and can rapidly build prototypes of “cutting-edge 5G concepts.”

“Their involvement helps enable us to build a prototype capable of securing 5G communications in the most difficult environments,” he said in a statement.

Arlington IT firm announces second merger

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Almost a year after its last merger, Arlington-based IT company C3 Integrated Solutions celebrated another major consolidation.

Last week, C3 announced its merger with Ingalls Information Security, a company based in Woodworth, Louisiana specializing in cybersecurity risk management for the defense industry.

C3 CEO Marc Pantoni says the merger is a response to evolving industry requirements concerning cybersecurity.

“Given how tightly integrated cybersecurity has become with day-to-day IT operations and compliance requirements, we believe it critical that we offer top-tier cybersecurity services that as part of our portfolio,” he wrote in a blog post.

The merger brings combines Ingalls’ expertise in Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) — a Dept. of Defense (DoD) benchmark for cybersecurity in government-contracted companies — with C3’s managed IT and Microsoft Cloud solutions, according to a separate blog post by Ingalls CEO and founder Jason Ingalls.

“With this merger, our clients can now turn to a single service partner for all their needs without sacrificing quality of service,” Pantoni said. “That means a single source of accountability, increased cost efficiencies, and fewer partners to manage.”

Banner announcing merger of C3 and Ingalls Information Security (via LinkedIn/C3 Integrated Solutions)

The merger, akin to last year’s, aims to help clients navigate new Dept. of Defense guidelines which were recently updated to ensure contractors and subcontractors comply with stringent cybersecurity standards to safeguard sensitive, unclassified information.

“With CMMC soon becoming a baseline contractual requirement, defense contractors are looking for a partner to support them through their entire compliance journey,” the joint release said.

“As cybersecurity, IT, and compliance become increasingly intertwined, members of the DIB can now turn to C3 as a single managed services partner for all their IT, cybersecurity, and compliance needs without sacrificing quality of service,” the release continued.

Four Arlington startups rank among North America’s top 500 fastest-growing tech companies

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Four Arlington-based startups have made it onto Deloitte’s 2023 North America Technology Fast 500 Rankings list, released last week.

They are:

  • 29. GoTab, with 6,080% growth
  • 372. Brazen, with 342% growth
  • 423. Interos, with 287% growth
  • 525. Govini, with 212% growth

Awardees were selected based on percentage fiscal year revenue growth from 2019 to 2022, which ranged anywhere from 201% to 222,189% but had an average growth rate of 1,934% and a median growth rate of 497%, per a press release.

“Each year, we look forward to reviewing the progress and innovations of our Technology Fast 500 winners,” said Paul Silverglate, vice chair, Deloitte LLP and U.S. technology sector leader, in a statement. “This year is especially celebratory as we expand the number of winners to better represent just how many companies are developing new ideas to progress our society and the world, especially during a slow economy.”

Deloitte 2023 Technology Fast 500 Rankings illustration (via Deloitte)

All four Arlington companies have seen big changes recently. For most, the challenges Covid presented became fuel for their achievements.

GoTab’s streamlined ordering platform tailored to customers and restaurant staff rocketed into the public eye during Covid, when venues had to adapt to contact-less interactions. It has since launched new platforms, raised millions and expanded into Canada.

The fintech company Interos was founded in 2005 but its mission — using artificial intelligence-powered software to help businesses identify disruptions to their supply chain — became especially relevant during Covid, which caused trade restrictions and product shortages.

In 2021, Interos became Arlington’s first private startup to reach “unicorn” status, or a $1 billion valuation. Between 2019 and 2021, the company grew by 303% and has had its platform used by NASA, the U.S Department of Defense and several Fortune 500 companies.

Brazen provides virtual and in-person recruiting solutions to speed up the hiring process and works with some of the top brands in the world, including 15% of the Fortune 100. It has been expanding since it raised $3 million in 2019, but saw a marked increase in interest during Covid, when virtual events became the norm.

It was recently acquired by the cloud-based talent acquisition software provider Radancy.

Govini uses data and machine learning to advance U.S. competitiveness and combat eroding military dominance. Its claims to fame include a $400 million indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity, 5-year contract for data and analytics with the Pentagon, which it landed in 2019.

This year, it launched Ark.ai, which uses AI and machine learning to scan commercially available data for information to address “challenges in supply chain, nuclear modernization, acquisition, procurement, science and technology and foreign influence,” per a press release.

The company tied its recent growth not to Covid but with other current events: China’s rise to power and Russia’s war with Ukraine.

“In the face of these threats, national security leaders have realized that maximizing the Defense Acquisition Process is the first step to building an enduring military advantage,” Govini CEO Tara Murphy Dougherty said in another press release.

“This shift is evident in our growth and the widespread adoption of our flagship product, Ark.ai, across the Department of Defense,” she continued. “Govini remains deeply committed to equipping the defense community with a platform that answers the growing call for rapid, data-informed acquisition.”

(more…)

To spur vehicle electrification, this Crystal City startup is tackling the hurdle of charging infrastructure

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Amid new federal efforts to push for the adoption of electric vehicles, a local software firm is helping truck fleets, property owners and utility companies electrify.

“More and more, large players, in fleets, in commercial real estate and on the utility side, are thinking about making these investments, and they need analytics to underwrite and justify these investments to enable the transition,” says Ann Xu, the co-founder and CEO of Crystal City-based ElectroTempo.

Her company works with companies in different industries to understand how much it would cost to electrify fleets and install the charging infrastructure they need, among other considerations.

Fellow co-founder and Chief Operating Officer Patrick Finch says the push to electrify, fueled by climate change concerns, is an “unprecedented challenge.” Companies and governments have to replace gas-based infrastructure that took a century to install and cannot be repurposed in an electric future, all while scaling up the operations of the electrical grid.

“The challenge still remains that the charging infrastructure is the biggest barrier to adoption because fleets cannot risk their operations if they don’t have the confidence in their ability to recharge their vehicles,” Xu said. “That remains where we firmly plug in, no pun intended.”

ElectroTempo was founded in November 2020 and, in the spring of 2022, was among the first cohort of businesses to move into the Crystal City startup incubator and accelerator space operated by the French company Zebox. This August, the startup raised $4 million in seed funding, which the company will use to expand where it operates and round out its software product.

The ElectroTempo team (courtesy Ann Xu)

The round, led by a Chicago-based, woman-led investment firm, was difficult to close but ElectroTempo emerged the stronger for it, Xu said.

“Three weeks into our fundraising process, the Silicon Valley Bank collapsed,” she said. “So, it was a very dark time for just the venture community as a whole… The general trend was that strong companies still [made it out] stronger, and we’re lucky to be one of them. We believe that that is because of our fundamental value proposition, how big the market is and the strength of our team.”

Today, ElectroTempo works in Texas — where the company got started — as well as New York, Massachusetts and Virginia, where it has support from the state’s Innovation Partnership Corporation. The funding is intended to fuel ElectroTempo’s expansion into California and Oregon as well as plans to break into more states. It will also pay for upgrades to the company’s software meets the different needs of clients.

“There are so many different types of customers at different stages of electrification and at every stage of their journey,” Xu said. “They need something a little bit different from our product.”

These milestones for ElectroTempo come amid a changing landscape for vehicle electrification, says Finch.

Not only are there new federal incentives for shipping companies to take advantage of, but there are also looming state time limits for going electric. California, for instance, has a policy to effectively phase out diesel trucks by 2035.

“The detachment between setting a really aggressive target and actually getting to said target is quite wide and the amount of infrastructure needed to support an electric truck future is quite expensive,” he said. “We’re focused on bridging that gap because people aren’t going to stop setting the goals. The goals need to be aggressive if you’re going to address climate change in any meaningful way.”

Arlington startup VerticalApps acquired by Fairfax County-based MindPetal 

By Jo DeVoe

Sponsored by Monday Properties and written by ARLnow, Startup Monday is a weekly column that profiles Arlington-based startups, founders, and other local technology news. Monday Properties is proudly featuring Three Ballston Plaza. 

Arlington-based VerticalApps, which uses automation technologies such as artificial intelligence to streamline how federal agencies operate, will be acquired by a Vienna-based government contractor.

MindPetal, which provides IT solutions to the government, announced earlier this month that it has “entered into a definitive agreement” to acquire VerticalApps.

Effective this Wednesday, VerticalApps will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of MindPetal, per a press release. The companies say will accelerate the modernization of federal agencies through the use of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), predictive analytics and data science.

“Our team — including our leadership and [Intelligent Automation] experts — are excited to join forces with MindPetal to help federal agencies embrace the promise of AI/ML,” VerticalApps said on LinkedIn.

Founded in 2010, the Ballston startup develops software and data management solutions and specializes in intelligent automation, which applies automation technologies to making decisions and predictions and analyzing data. It works with top agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security, the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

“We are thrilled to join forces with MindPetal,”  VerticalApps Co-Founder Will Choi said in a statement. “Our partnership will allow us to expand our team, share our expertise, and help federal leaders embrace the promise of AI to build better digital experiences.”

VerticalApps acquisition banner (via VerticalApps/LinkedIn)

This next step for the company comes after receiving some prestigious local and national recognition in recent years. This year, it was recognized this year as one of several federal government contractors “doing it right” when it comes to “corporate culture, mission support and employee focus.”

In 2020, VerticalApps was named one of the “Best Places to Work” by the Washington Business Journal and Virginia Business, which ranked it third among Virginia small businesses, according to Arlington Economic Development. That year, it also landed on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies in the U.S., with a growth rate of 336%.

Choi and executives Michael and Paul Grace will move into MindPetal’s leadership team. Choi will become Chief Operating Officer, Paul Grace the Chief Finance Officer and Michael will serve as Senior Vice-President for Program Delivery. MindPetal COO Michael Agrillo will become president of the combined company.

“This is an exciting moment for MindPetal and for our customers,” MindPetal CEO Sony George said in a statement. “VerticalApps brings an experienced team with deep expertise and superlative past performance that will accelerate our growth and deliver immediate value to our federal customers.”

Located in Vienna, MindPetal is ranked 17th in the Government Service Sector of the Inc. 5000 and ninth in the D.C. area and 147th in the country for small businesses.

View More Stories