Desert Angels

A small group of Tucson-based private investors formed the Desert Angels™ in 2000. Since that time, the Desert Angels has grown to become one of the country’s leading angel investor groups. Today, the organization has over 85 members, many of whom have invested in a significant portfolio of companies. The primary focus of the Desert Angels is to fund entrepreneurial ventures. To that end, the organization reviews over 300 applications per year as possible investments. Those companies that excel during the Desert Angels’ rigorous screening process are invited to present to the organization’s general membership at one of its monthly dinner meetings. The Desert Angels hold monthly dinner meetings from September through June. In addition to listening to one or two companies, members often hear from nationally recognized speakers including successful entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and thought leaders in the angel investment community. As the Desert Angels has grown, its members have become increasingly involved in educational activities in the Tucson community. These activities have included sponsoring the local presentation of the Kauffman Foundation’s “Power of Angel Investing” seminar and assisting the University of Arizona’s Eller College of Management and its McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship.

JoAnn MacMaster

CEO

28 past transactions

ClickIPO

Seed Round in 2017
ClickIPO is a financial services company that specializes in the fields of initial public offerings, securities, software, IPO, and investing. It offers a software platform for issuers, underwriters, and online brokerages to leverage the benefits of broad retail distribution and gain access to a large liquidity pipe of buy and hold retail investors, across multiple online brokerages. The company was founded in 2011 and headquartered in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Qwick

Seed Round in 2018
Qwick is a Phoenix-based on-demand staffing company that connects service industry professionals with food and beverage shifts in real-time. Founded in 2017 by Jamie Baxter, Blaine Light and Chris Loeffler, Qwick provides a platform for food and beverage professionals to connect directly with hotels, caterers, event venues and restaurants with the freedom and flexibility to work on their own schedules. Qwick provides hospitality businesses with a 98 percent average fill-rate and immediate access to a pre-vetted and certified gig economy workforce. Qwick was incubated by Coplex, is backed by national investors including Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund and Peak Ventures, and partners with top hospitality brand leaders including Hilton, Aramark, and Marriott International.

CampusLogic, Inc.

Seed Round in 2015
CampusLogic provides critical tools and resources for the 15 million students who travel the higher education journey each year. The company currently serves more than 750 schools increase enrollment, retention, and graduation rates with a platform, which includes a net price calculator, complete scholarship management, personalized digital communications, simplified financial aid verification, 24×7 personalized virtual advising, tuition, and scholarship crowdfunding, and integrated data visualizations.

Vartega Inc.

Pre Seed Round in 2017
Vartega Carbon Fiber Recycling LLC develops carbon fiber recycling processes and operates CFRP recycling facilities. The company develops alternative technology, processes, and equipment to provide low-cost carbon fiber for use in mass market applications. It develops carbon fiber through the use of its patent pending recycling process to be used in applications including nonwoven fabrics, thermoplastic pellets, yarns, and 3D printing filaments. The company was founded in 2013 and is based in Denver, Colorado.

Aural Analytics

Seed Round in 2019
Aural Analytics, Inc. designs and develops application that detect changes in brain health. It offers multi-modal brain health analytics platform. The company was founded in 2015 and is based in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Yapert

Angel Round in 2014
Yapert is headquartered in San Diego and operates MyFvs, a pop culture portal and community for millennials. MyFvs curates the most popular visual content from across the social world including music, entertainment, sports, fashion, fitness and lifestyle interests. By directly working with content creators such as media companies, brands, entertainers, and musicians, MyFvs also offers exclusive, behind the scenes content.
GT Medical Technologies, Inc. develops and manufactures a medical equipment for the treatment of brain tumors. The company offers GammaTile, a biocompatible device that combines conformable collagen matrix with brachytherapy (radiation) seeds. The company caters to the healthcare industry. GT Medical Technologies, Inc. was formerly known as Gammatile, Inc. The company was founded in 2017 and is based in Tempe, Arizona.

Codelucida

Angel Round in 2017
Codelucida, Inc. develops customized low density parity-check based error correction solutions for the storage and communications industry. It provides solutions for storage products, including solid-state drives and hard-disk drives. The company was founded in 2012 and is based in Tucson, Arizona.

Picmonic

Series A in 2015
Picmonic Inc. develops and operates Picmonic, an audiovisual platform for learning. Its platform helps students improve their memory retention and score higher in exams. The company’s platform takes the textbook information for topics, such as pharmaceuticals, med-surgical, fundamentals, and more and turns them into images and stories for making studying more effective. Its platform also provides learning tools that help users learn, review, and quiz themselves, as well as search, filter, and sort for specific topics, characters, or books. The company’s platform covers topics in the areas of pharmacology, microbiology, biochemistry, anatomy, social/behavioral, organ based, pathology and physiology, psychiatric, pediatrics, and obstetrics. It serves nursing, medicine, and MCAT biology students. Picmonic Inc. was incorporated in 2011 and is based in Tempe, Arizona.

Siamab Therapeutics, Inc.

Series B in 2014
Siamab Therapeutics is a biopharmaceutical company that develops therapies targeting abnormal carbohydrates found only on cancer cells. It has developed a platform of technologies that enables the discovery and development of anti-TACA therapeutic antibodies. The company’s core technologies were licensed from the laboratory of Ajit Varki, a professional in glycobiology and sialic-acid biochemistry. It has brought together a team of scientists and advisors in oncology, glycoimmunology, and antibody engineering to support its anti-TACA antibody discovery and development programs. Siamab Therapeutics was founded in 2006 and is headquartered in Newton, M.A.

Crowd Mics

Seed Round in 2015
Crowd Mics turns the audiences iOS and Android devices into wireless microphones for live events. Crowd Mics is an award winning app that powers audience engagement. They have created the first downloadable microphone for live events. The audience can talk into their phones and be heard over the sound system. The app also includes text commenting and live polling features. Crowd Mics is the microphone for the people!

Post.Bid.Ship

Series A in 2018
Post.Bid.Ship, Inc. operates as an online freight matching platform for shippers, carriers, and brokers and 3PLs in North America. Its online load bidding system enables shippers to create their accounts; post their freight needs; verify its member carriers’ authority, insurance, and safety records; protect their company’s contact information during the bidding process; review bids; and select a winning carrier. The company’s online load bidding system also allows carriers to create their accounts, set freight alarms, review and bid on loads, and connect with shippers. It serves commercial shippers, trucking firms, freight brokers, and private fleet. Post.Bid.Ship, Inc. was formerly known as TruckItNow, Inc. and changed the name to Post.Bid.Ship, Inc. in November 2011. The company was founded in 2010 and is based in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Botco.ai

Seed Round in 2020
Botco.ai, Inc. develops a conversational marketing platform that enables chat between businesses and their customers. It offers Botco.ai, an AI powered intelligent chat solution that helps businesses to answer customer’s questions and simplify the buying process. The company’s Botco.ai allows businesses to incorporate conversation templates; answer common questions; and know exactly what their user base is experiencing. The company was incorporated in 2016 and is based in Milpitas, California.

Vartega Inc.

Convertible Note in 2018
Vartega Carbon Fiber Recycling LLC develops carbon fiber recycling processes and operates CFRP recycling facilities. The company develops alternative technology, processes, and equipment to provide low-cost carbon fiber for use in mass market applications. It develops carbon fiber through the use of its patent pending recycling process to be used in applications including nonwoven fabrics, thermoplastic pellets, yarns, and 3D printing filaments. The company was founded in 2013 and is based in Denver, Colorado.

The rSmart Group, Inc.

Series A in 2006
The rSmart Group, Inc. develops open source application software and solutions for higher education. Its product includes OneCampus, a cloud-based service discovery platform that helps users locate and access campus information and applications. The company also provides students, faculty, and staff access to campus services. Its clientele include Lynn University, University of Delaware, Purdue University, University of Maryland, and University of Hawaii. The rSmart Group, Inc. was founded in 2002 and is based in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Regulonix, LLC

Seed Round in 2018
Regulonix is an early-stage biotechnology company developing non-opioid drugs for chronic pain. By indirectly targeting the sodium channel NaV1.7 – a well-established and genetically validated pain target – and focusing on the signaling pathways that control this channel’s activity, the Regulonix team has isolated compounds demonstrated in animal models to be non-addictive and more effective than morphine. This unique platform helps address a global pain management therapeutics market projected to reach $83B by 2024, affecting more than 100 million Americans and 1.5 billion people globally.

ClearVoice

Venture Round in 2016
ClearVoice helps companies create engaging content to power their blogs, SEO, social media, and marketing automation. Its content marketing platform offers access to content strategists, industry expert writers, and editors to enable scalable, high-quality content. It was founded in 2014 and headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona.

Recoleta Digital Media

Series A in 2015
There are thousands of products on sale in a grocery store in a typical week, but grocers can only fit 150 to 200 of them into their weekly newspaper circular. As a result, an individual shopper may be interested in only a few of those products.

Vector Launch, Inc.

Venture Round in 2017
Vector was founded by several members of the original SpaceX team and is a disruptive innovator that connects space startups with affordable and frequent launch and platforms to enable space capabilities at a speed and price point never before possible. Vector has a big vision to reshape the 400 billion dollar space market by combining dedicated low-cost micro satellite launch and software defined satellites (Galactic Sky) to dramatically increase access and speed to orbit.

The rSmart Group, Inc.

Series A in 2009
The rSmart Group, Inc. develops open source application software and solutions for higher education. Its product includes OneCampus, a cloud-based service discovery platform that helps users locate and access campus information and applications. The company also provides students, faculty, and staff access to campus services. Its clientele include Lynn University, University of Delaware, Purdue University, University of Maryland, and University of Hawaii. The rSmart Group, Inc. was founded in 2002 and is based in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Tempronics, Inc.

Series C in 2016
Tempronics is developing devices to revolutionize the way we cool things and generate electricity. Thermoelectric devices have the potential to replace rotating machines used today for cooling and power generation, including compressors, gas turbines, steam turbines and electrical generators. These machines are noisy, heavy, and wear out from moving parts. Thermoelectric devices are solid state chips that are lighter, silent, potentially more efficient, and do not require environmentally damaging fluids like Freon.

Qwick

Seed Round in 2019
Qwick is a Phoenix-based on-demand staffing company that connects service industry professionals with food and beverage shifts in real-time. Founded in 2017 by Jamie Baxter, Blaine Light and Chris Loeffler, Qwick provides a platform for food and beverage professionals to connect directly with hotels, caterers, event venues and restaurants with the freedom and flexibility to work on their own schedules. Qwick provides hospitality businesses with a 98 percent average fill-rate and immediate access to a pre-vetted and certified gig economy workforce. Qwick was incubated by Coplex, is backed by national investors including Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund and Peak Ventures, and partners with top hospitality brand leaders including Hilton, Aramark, and Marriott International.

CellzDirect

Venture Round in 2002
CellzDirect, Inc., a bioscience company, provides cell products and contract laboratory services to bio/pharmaceutical companies. It focuses primarily on drug metabolism and toxicology. CellzDirect serves pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and chemical companies, as well as various academic and governmental agencies. The company has a facility in Austin, Texas. CellzDirect, Inc. was founded in 2002 and is based in Durham, North Carolina. As of January 31, 2008, CellzDirect, Inc. operates as a subsidiary of Life Technologies Corporation.