VentureSouth invests more than $9M in Southeastern business

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South Carolina’s Proterra, PunchList, Sprockets (formerly named Sentio) and 6 AM were a few startups that benefited from a relationship with Greenville’s VentureSouth last year, receiving a share of $9.2 million in investment given to 26 Southeastern companies in 2020, according to a news release.

More than 60% of that funding went to existing early-stage companies in the VentureSouth portfolio, including North Carolina’s Kwipped, ProctorFree, Reveal Mobile and Spiffy, as well as Virginia’s Aperiomics and Georgia’s GoPivot.

Live Furnish in Winston-Salem, an image production technology platform for the furnishings industry; Durham’s locally sourced frozen fruits and vegetable company Seal the Seasons; and Greensboro’s advanced solid state battery component developer Soelect were three North Carolina companies added to the VentureSouth portfolio last year. Pass It Down, a digital display engagement platform in Chattanooga, Tenn., also made the cut for new investment, according to the release.

“We entered this pandemic just as many other investors, entrepreneurs and business leaders did — concerned about our portfolio companies and uncertain how they would weather the storm,” Charlie Banks, managing director of VentureSouth, said in the news release. “However, the positive response from our investor members and the resourceful, tenacious responses from the many founders throughout our portfolio proved to be both effective and inspiring. The crucible of challenges in 2020 have helped further our belief in the strength of entrepreneurs and startups in the region, as well as the infrastructure we’ve built to enable a broad base of investors to fund them with conviction.”