The Roundup: Vytalize Health, Edison Partners in growth mode

Vytalize Health closed $100 million in funding led by Enhanced Healthcare Partners and Monroe Capital, with participation from North Coast Ventures.

The risk-bearing provider enablement platform, which calls Hoboken home, announced the new capital Feb. 22. According to the firm, it will be used to accelerate Vytalize Health’s goal to advance responsible Medicare value-based care programs for seniors by way of strengthening primary care practices. It does that by allowing physicians to focus on just two things, according to the company’s website: treating patients and closing ACO care gaps.

Vytalize says the 2,500 providers it partners with cover more than 250,000 patients, offering evidence-based recommendations at the point of care.

“We have a responsibility to ensure the ongoing success of value-based care by building high-performing systems of care that truly advance quality, improve the patient experience, and are sustainable for providers and the system overall,” said Vytalize Health co-founder and CEO Faris Ghawi in a statement. “We believe primary care is a key part of the delivery system and that we must protect and reward independent primary care physicians who deliver more data-driven and effective care to patients.”

In the announcement, Vytalize pointed out that decisions about care in the primary setting have ripple effects that resonate across health care quality and spending, due to primary care physicians’ significant influence on a portion of downstream utilization.

“In this outcome-based environment, we can focus on real, proactive health care vs. sick care and align our model with what’s better for patients,” Ghawi added.

While providers are focused on those two care-centric points, Vytalize works to improve access by handling: value-based incentives, data analysis, virtual care, in-home care, care coordination, downstream network management, payer contracting and quality reporting.

Edison Partners

Edison Partners has been busy in 2023, contributing a cumulative $66 million in growth funding for RapidDeploy and MacroFab. Beyond the January funding rounds, the Princeton-based growth equity firm, which is focused on technology-enabled and SaaS solutions, also announced an investment in its own future: promoting three members of the investment team and appointing former Warburg Pincus Managing Director John Shearburn as senior advisor to the firm.

For MacroFab, a cloud manufacturing platform for building electronics from prototype to high-scale production, Edison Partners – an existing investor along with ATX Venture Partners – was part of the $42 million funding round led by Foundry and joined by BMW i Ventures, according to a press release.

The latest financing brings MacroFab’s total funding to $82 million, enabling its accelerated growth amid global supply chains that continue to evolve. According to the company, its network extends across more than 100 factories in North America.

“Most companies have felt the pain of inflexible and fragile supply chains,” said Daniel Herscovici, partner, Edison Partners, in a prepared statement. “MacroFab’s cloud manufacturing platform is transforming contract manufacturing, enabling Made in North America, faster design iteration, and increased supply chain resiliency, among its benefits.

“Edison Partners shares the company’s vision for addressing this $100B+ global market,” he added.

MacroFab’s platform helps to manage electronics manufacturing, providing customers with a keen look into their production with real-time supply chain and inventory data.

The company said shipments were up 275% year over year, while it also doubled its workforce and launched a new facility in Mexico to assist customers with managing inventory and reducing the impact of tariffs.

According to a 2022 report from McKinsey & Co., 44% of supply chain leaders surveyed by the research firm said they had increased their regional sourcing in the past 12 months; 51% said they expected that way of doing things to become more relevant in 2023 and beyond.

That trend, according to MicroFab, puts the company at the forefront of allowing firms to do just that – overhaul their supply chains – and modernize their electronics manufacturing.

Days after the MicroFab investment was announced, in a blog post on its website, Edison Partners announced leading $34 million in new growth capital in RapidDeploy with participation from existing financial and strategic investors GreatPoint Ventures, Morpheus Ventures, GM Ventures, Ericsson Ventures, Tao Capital Partners, Clearvision Ventures, Tau Ventures, NedBank CIB and others.

The funding brings RapidDeploy’s total raised to $87 million.

The company is the leading provider of cloud-native 911 mapping and analytics solutions, growing to 10 statewide contracts and more than 1,500 contracted 911 centers using the platform, according to Edison Partners. The company’s also engaged the business world, most recently sealing a deal with General Motors’ OnStar for its call centers.

The new growth investment will allow RapidDeploy to build on that work, accelerate go-to-market initiatives and continue innovating.

“With this investment, we’ll be able to further our mission of saving lives by reducing response times,” Steve Raucher, CEO and co-founder of RapidDeploy, said in a prepared statement. “We are excited to have Edison Partners as the lead investor with such deep operational expertise. This investment will help us serve our customers with proven experience in delivering tightly integrated mission-critical software to one of the most demanding industries in the United States. We are here to serve the mission!”

Daniel Herscovici, partner at Edison Partners, led the investment. He described Raucher and the RapidDeploy team as “the premier partner and innovator,” calling their tech advantage “significant.”

“Their vision of creating an operating system for next-generation 911 response will save lives and transform our nation’s emergency infrastructure,” Herscovici said.

RapidDeploy’s next-generation, cloud-native solutions include:

• Radius Mapping – a tool designed to reduce response times and improve the way 911 calls are handled
• Eclipse Analytics – which helps public safety leaders make informed decisions to improve the functionality of the entire emergency workflow

“First Responders should have access to configurable solutions that tap into all available data streams and communications methods in an easy-to-digest single pane of glass. RapidDeploy’s Radius Mapping and Eclipse Analytics product adoption provides strong validation that they are the solution of choice,” Herscovici said.

Edison Partners’ most recent investment, though, was in itself.

Along with the appointment of Shearburn as senior advisor to the firm, the company announced three elevations: Steve Zieja to principal, Grace Hahn to senior associate and Dylan Kiger to associate. Moves that followed Kelly Ford recently being named as the first chief operating officer for Edison Partners and the additions of two other team members, Rush Baker as partner, head of investor relations and Casey Myers as partner, head of the Edison Edge value creation platform.

Of the newest moves, Ford said, “With these promotions, we recognize not only meaningful professional growth and results, but also the ‘whatever it takes’ attitude these individuals demonstrate every day that drive our firm’s culture, build for its future, and, ultimately, benefit our limited partners and portfolio companies.”

Zieja joined Edison Partners in early 2022; he focuses on investments in the enterprise solutions section, including the firm’s $20 million investment in Field Effect, and leads the investment development team. Hahn’s work finds her identifying, evaluating and executing investment opportunities. According to Edison Partners, she played an important role in the firm’s investment in K1x. Kiger joined the company in 2020 as a summer intern; he sources and evaluates investments across fintech, health care IT and enterprise solutions.

Recently retired as a managing director and member of the Executive Management Group at global private equity firm Warburg Pincus, Shearburn will offer guidance and support, especially with regard to fundraising and investor relations.

At the beginning of February, Edison Partners had made six investments since the fourth quarter of 2022, along with the aforementioned MacroFab, RapidDeploy and K1x, in Field Effect, SPHERE and Lokavant.

“All of these developments underscore our commitment to investing in Edison Partners’ future, building a forever firm with enduring culture, a stellar portfolio and a talented and fully integrated team whose expertise and work together span investment execution and value creation throughout the entire investment lifecycle,” Chris Sugden, managing partner, Edison Partners, said in a statement.