Brightstone VIII

Brightstone VIII is a venture capital fund managed by Brightstone Venture Capital, a Minneapolis-based private equity firm established in 1985. The firm specializes in early-stage investments, focusing on technology and life science companies across the United States. With a 30-year history of fostering successful businesses, Brightstone Venture Capital seeks to partner with innovative entrepreneurs who possess a unique vision for addressing significant challenges in expanding markets. The firm is dedicated to supporting these entrepreneurs in realizing their ambitious goals.

Jeff Cowan

Managing Partner

David Dalvey

Managing General Partner

Patrick O'Shaughnessy

Managing Partner

35 past transactions

Xplore

Series A in 2022
Xplore Inc is engaged in the development of space aircraft and offers space as a service. Founded in 2017 and based in Mercer Island, Washington, the company provides a range of services, including mission planning, spacecraft engineering, flight financing, payload insurance, communications, data management, and spacecraft operations. Xplore caters to government agencies and commercial space companies, facilitating missions to various celestial bodies such as the Moon, Earth, Venus, Mars, asteroids, and custom expeditions. The company operates commercial missions in Earth orbit using its XCRAFT™, transporting civilian, commercial, and national security payloads for scientific and reconnaissance purposes.

Xplore

Series A in 2022
Xplore Inc is engaged in the development of space aircraft and offers space as a service. Founded in 2017 and based in Mercer Island, Washington, the company provides a range of services, including mission planning, spacecraft engineering, flight financing, payload insurance, communications, data management, and spacecraft operations. Xplore caters to government agencies and commercial space companies, facilitating missions to various celestial bodies such as the Moon, Earth, Venus, Mars, asteroids, and custom expeditions. The company operates commercial missions in Earth orbit using its XCRAFT™, transporting civilian, commercial, and national security payloads for scientific and reconnaissance purposes.

Mosaic

Series B in 2021
Mosaic Building Group, Inc. is a technology-focused construction company based in Phoenix, Arizona, with additional offices in San Francisco, California. Founded in 2015, the company provides a range of construction services to homebuilders, including general contracting, framing, plumbing, electrical, drywall, and site work. Mosaic specializes in single-family, multi-family, custom homebuilding, and build-to-rent projects. With a commitment to enhancing efficiency in the construction process, Mosaic employs advanced technologies and programming to automate various tasks, resulting in faster and more streamlined homebuilding. The company's mission centers on creating communities that foster a sense of connection and belonging, aiming to make beautiful living environments accessible to a broader audience.

Eternal

Seed Round in 2020
Eternal is a company that develops an avatar social network, which allows users to create and interact through personalized avatars. Founded in 2018 and headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, the company launched a private beta of its platform in January 2020. Eternal aims to provide a unique social experience by enabling users to express themselves and connect with others in a virtual environment.

Cryosa

Series A in 2020
CryOSA, Inc., a medical device company, develops novel treatments for patients with sleep disordered breathing. It offers therapies for obstructive sleep apnea. CryOSA, Inc. was incorporated in 2014 and is based in Roseville, Minnesota.

Aria CV

Series B in 2020
Aria CV was founded in 2010 by Drs. John Scandurra and Karl Vollmers, formerly Fellows at the University of Minnesota’s Medical Devices Center. Aria has an exclusive license to certain patents from the University of Minnesota. Aria CV’s device has the potential to improve outcomes by reducing the workload on the right side of the heart.

VRChat

Series C in 2019
VRChat is a virtual reality social platform established in 2014 and headquartered in San Francisco, California. It enables users to create and explore virtual worlds, allowing them to interact with others in a social setting. The platform facilitates the development of custom avatars and the building of 3D environments, which users can navigate together. Content creators can publish their virtual worlds and sell them through the VRChat marketplace, enhancing the platform's community-driven experience. By providing tools that allow for quick and easy world-building, VRChat fosters creativity and collaboration among its users, making it a unique space for social engagement in virtual reality.

Viosera Therapeutics

Seed Round in 2019
Viosera Therapeutics is a predict and block drug resistance in cancer and bacteria. The company discovers synergies between approved drugs and develop combinations of drugs that suppress resistance. Antibiotic resistance makes it necessary to develop better treatments for deadly infections. Viosera Therapeutics was founded in July 2016 and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.

Intact Therapeutics

Seed Round in 2019
Intact Therapeutics designs and develops a thermosensitive drug delivery platform for the treatment of gastrointestinal (GI) disorders. The company was founded in 2015 and is based in Belmont, California.

StemoniX

Series B in 2019
StemoniX Inc. is a biotechnology company that specializes in stem cell technologies to enhance drug discovery and personalized medicine. Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, with an additional office in La Jolla, California, StemoniX provides innovative platforms for pharmaceutical and research institutions. Its flagship solution focuses on the three-dimensional printing of stem-cell-derived human tissue, enabling the creation of living cells in larger formats. This technology is particularly beneficial for studying various diseases, including heart disease, dementia, breast cancer, autism, and ALS. By advancing the production and application of stem cell technologies, StemoniX aims to meet the evolving needs of the healthcare sector.

CodeStream

Seed Round in 2018
CodeStream puts team chat directly into today’s most popular IDEs, making it easier for developers to talk about code and write software together. Build for coders by coders, its service helps software teams accelerate their development cycles and reduce technical debt through faster, easier communication.

CNEX Labs

Series D in 2018
CNEX Labs, Inc. develops storage semiconductor and software solutions. It offers NVMe PCIe SSD controller ASIC that supports LightNVM/Open-Channel operation that includes native NVMoE I/O connectivity. The company’s NVMe and Open-Channel SSD controller ASICs deliver high-performance with low and predictable latency, scalability, and flexibility for software-defined-storage. Its controller products accelerate the capabilities of big data computing and analytics for cloud, hyperscale, and enterprise data centers. The company was incorporated in 2013 and is based in San Jose, California with additional offices in Copenhagen, Denmark; Shanghai, China; Hangzhou, China; and Tokyo, Japan.

Vathys

Seed Round in 2018
Vathys, Inc. manufactures deep learning processor chips. The company was formerly known as Ingemini, LLC and changed its name in January 2018. Vathys, Inc. was founded in 2016 and is headquartered in Portland, Oregon.

Wasabi

Series B in 2018
Wasabi Technologies, Inc. is a cloud storage provider that offers a fast and cost-effective platform for hybrid and multi-cloud media workflows. The company specializes in hot storage solutions compatible with Amazon S3, delivering average time-to-first-byte speeds of less than 15 milliseconds and ensuring data integrity with active checking. Wasabi's services support a variety of applications, including archiving, backup and recovery, content delivery, and data analytics, catering to sectors such as media and entertainment, education, healthcare, and law enforcement. The company provides a free trial capped at 1 TB of storage and offers flexible pricing options, ensuring that organizations can access secure and reliable data storage without complex pricing structures or unpredictable fees. Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, Wasabi was previously known as BlueArchive, Inc. before rebranding in 2017.

Jido Inc.

Seed Round in 2018
Jido is bringing in the next wave of AR where digital content can have a shared and persistent life in the real world. Our API uses intimate understanding of a users spatial context to preserve AR experiences across users and devices. Our research team came out of the Stanford Artifical Intelligence Labs and the Cornell Robot Learning Lab.

VRChat

Series A in 2017
VRChat is a virtual reality social platform established in 2014 and headquartered in San Francisco, California. It enables users to create and explore virtual worlds, allowing them to interact with others in a social setting. The platform facilitates the development of custom avatars and the building of 3D environments, which users can navigate together. Content creators can publish their virtual worlds and sell them through the VRChat marketplace, enhancing the platform's community-driven experience. By providing tools that allow for quick and easy world-building, VRChat fosters creativity and collaboration among its users, making it a unique space for social engagement in virtual reality.

Wasabi

Series A in 2017
Wasabi Technologies, Inc. is a cloud storage provider that offers a fast and cost-effective platform for hybrid and multi-cloud media workflows. The company specializes in hot storage solutions compatible with Amazon S3, delivering average time-to-first-byte speeds of less than 15 milliseconds and ensuring data integrity with active checking. Wasabi's services support a variety of applications, including archiving, backup and recovery, content delivery, and data analytics, catering to sectors such as media and entertainment, education, healthcare, and law enforcement. The company provides a free trial capped at 1 TB of storage and offers flexible pricing options, ensuring that organizations can access secure and reliable data storage without complex pricing structures or unpredictable fees. Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, Wasabi was previously known as BlueArchive, Inc. before rebranding in 2017.

Wasabi

Seed Round in 2017
Wasabi Technologies, Inc. is a cloud storage provider that offers a fast and cost-effective platform for hybrid and multi-cloud media workflows. The company specializes in hot storage solutions compatible with Amazon S3, delivering average time-to-first-byte speeds of less than 15 milliseconds and ensuring data integrity with active checking. Wasabi's services support a variety of applications, including archiving, backup and recovery, content delivery, and data analytics, catering to sectors such as media and entertainment, education, healthcare, and law enforcement. The company provides a free trial capped at 1 TB of storage and offers flexible pricing options, ensuring that organizations can access secure and reliable data storage without complex pricing structures or unpredictable fees. Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, Wasabi was previously known as BlueArchive, Inc. before rebranding in 2017.

Atavium

Series A in 2017
Atavium, Inc. is a data management company based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, founded in 2015. It specializes in designing and developing a platform that organizes, automates, manages, and stores unstructured data sets, whether they reside in data centers or the cloud. The company's innovative system enables customers to automate the data lifecycle, even before data creation, addressing the growing challenges associated with unstructured data. The leadership team at Atavium comprises experienced professionals from the storage and networking sectors, with a proven track record of delivering impactful solutions that have been acquired by major technology firms. As of April 2020, Atavium operates as a subsidiary of Quantum Corporation.

Realvision

Seed Round in 2017
Realvision is an immersive media technology company that builds 3D media solutions for the real estate industry. Realvision is a technology platform built to support real estate agents, created for professional photographers.

VRChat

Seed Round in 2016
VRChat is a virtual reality social platform established in 2014 and headquartered in San Francisco, California. It enables users to create and explore virtual worlds, allowing them to interact with others in a social setting. The platform facilitates the development of custom avatars and the building of 3D environments, which users can navigate together. Content creators can publish their virtual worlds and sell them through the VRChat marketplace, enhancing the platform's community-driven experience. By providing tools that allow for quick and easy world-building, VRChat fosters creativity and collaboration among its users, making it a unique space for social engagement in virtual reality.

StemoniX

Seed Round in 2016
StemoniX Inc. is a biotechnology company that specializes in stem cell technologies to enhance drug discovery and personalized medicine. Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, with an additional office in La Jolla, California, StemoniX provides innovative platforms for pharmaceutical and research institutions. Its flagship solution focuses on the three-dimensional printing of stem-cell-derived human tissue, enabling the creation of living cells in larger formats. This technology is particularly beneficial for studying various diseases, including heart disease, dementia, breast cancer, autism, and ALS. By advancing the production and application of stem cell technologies, StemoniX aims to meet the evolving needs of the healthcare sector.

Bite Squad

Series A in 2015
In 2012, entrepreneurs Kian Salehi and Arash Allaei saw a need in their hometown community of Minneapolis for an easy, fast and affordable way to order delivery from all the wonderful restaurants in town. With years of restaurant experience under their belts, the pair decided to do something about it and Bite Squad was born. Bite Squad was created to be the last place you’ll ever have to go online to order cuisine for delivery or takeout. The company now partners with over 10,000 local restaurants in more than 400 cities nationwide, and employees over 5,000 drivers to deliver fresh food from the restaurant straight to the customer’s door—quickly and hassle-free!

truBrain

Seed Round in 2015
truBrain is building the next generation performance food and beverage brand. We leverage neurotechnology to redesign solutions in food and beverage, starting by disrupting the energy drink market with products that support direct focus instead of caffeine-induced alertness. truBrain is backed by SherpaVentures, Brightstone Venture Capital, and the Start Engine accelerator fund.

Gravia

Series B in 2015
Gravie, Inc. operates a health insurance platform that facilitates the comparison and purchase of health insurance plans for individuals, families, and employers. Founded in 2013 and headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the company provides a comprehensive solution for managing health insurance expenses through its mobile application and website. Gravie allows users to shop for insurance options available on government-run exchanges and directly from insurance companies. The platform also offers tools for employers to design custom benefits plans using a defined contribution approach, enabling them to set a fixed budget for employee health benefits. Additionally, Gravie provides year-round support, financial analysis, and services such as Gravie Care, which assists individuals in managing their healthcare expenses effectively.

FlipGrid

Series A in 2015
Vidku, a Minneapolis company born out of the the University of Minnesota, enables active, social learning in classrooms and enterprises around the world. Flipgrid, Vidku’s education technology platform, is a stimulus-driven video discussion and communication environment used in more than 40,000 classrooms, organizations, and enterprises across 115 countries on six continents.

HomeSpotter

Seed Round in 2015
HomeSpotter, LLC is a real estate technology company that develops mobile applications and web solutions aimed at providing real estate information and tools for agents, brokers, and multiple listing services across North America. Founded in 2009 and based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, HomeSpotter offers a mobile platform that enables over 250,000 agents to access property listings and communicate effectively with clients through built-in chat features. The platform utilizes real-time data from multiple listing services to help agents create and manage targeted advertising campaigns on social media, enhancing their marketing efforts. HomeSpotter was previously known as MobileRealtyApps.com, LLC before rebranding in January 2015.

Fortus Medical

Venture Round in 2014
Fortus Medical is a provider of medical products and health care solutions. Forus' proprietary technology is used to harvest a patient's own mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), and then effectively and economically remove impurities and red blood cells (which impede bone growth) leaving a highly concentrated stem cell solution, which is combined with bone graft material to repair and promote new bone growth in the patient. It was founded in 2011 and is headquartered in Incline Village, Nevada, United States.

Celcuity

Series A in 2014
Celcuity Inc. is a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on identifying cancer sub-types and therapeutic options for patients in the United States. Utilizing its CELsignia diagnostic platform, the company analyzes a patient’s living tumor cells to determine the specific abnormal cellular processes driving their cancer and the corresponding targeted therapies. Celcuity is developing the CELsignia HSF test to diagnose two new sub-types of HER2-negative breast cancer and is also working on the CELsignia MP test, which aims to identify 11 cancer sub-types across various cancers, including breast, lung, colon, ovarian, kidney, and bladder cancers. Founded in 2011 and headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Celcuity seeks to enhance treatment options and improve patient care in oncology.

Horizon Oilfield Services

Series A in 2013
At Horizon Oilfield Services, we deliver comprehensive oilfield wastewater disposal and gathering solutions for E&P Companies and for trucking companies. We own, operate and develop fully automated, state-of-the art, wastewater disposals and gathering systems at strategic locations for our customers.

HomeSpotter

Seed Round in 2013
HomeSpotter, LLC is a real estate technology company that develops mobile applications and web solutions aimed at providing real estate information and tools for agents, brokers, and multiple listing services across North America. Founded in 2009 and based in Minneapolis, Minnesota, HomeSpotter offers a mobile platform that enables over 250,000 agents to access property listings and communicate effectively with clients through built-in chat features. The platform utilizes real-time data from multiple listing services to help agents create and manage targeted advertising campaigns on social media, enhancing their marketing efforts. HomeSpotter was previously known as MobileRealtyApps.com, LLC before rebranding in January 2015.

Bnocular

Seed Round in 2013
Provider of a task management platform for the mobile workforce. The company is a combination of a software as a service and a mobile application that organizes tasks and employee-incentive programs.

Miromatrix Medical

Venture Round in 2012
Miromatrix Medical is a biotechnology company engaged in the development of fully biological human organs and organ-derived biological products to solve the chronic shortage of transplantable organs, utilizing its patented perfusion decellularization or recellularization technology, as well as organ-derived biological products for applications such as soft tissue reinforcement and advanced wound care. It was founded in 2009 and is based in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

Disc Dynamics

Series E in 2004
Disc Dynamics is a healthcare company. They design and develop medical products. The Company offers surgical alternatives for the treatment of lower back problems and disc diseases. It offers DASCOR Disc arthroplasty system, a catheter-based minimally invasive nucleus replacement technology for the treatment of degenerated lumbar discs. Disc Dynamics was founded by Jeffrey Felt in 2000 and is headquartered in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

Prolatus

Series C in 2001
Prolatus licenses software that allows customers to send large graphic files through regular telephone lines. The company targets pre-press, printing and content provider companies as its customers. See complete list.