Milwaukee-based BrightStar Wisconsin Foundation Inc. on Tuesday announced that it has made $50,000 seed round investments in two new Madison- based companies, AltusMedical Group Inc., and GrocerKey Inc.
Both companies participated in the accelerator program run by gener8tor, a Milwaukee- and Madison-based company that works with early-stage entrepreneurs. The BrightStar investment committee also approved three additional investments at its recent meeting, including a $150,000 investment in OKANJO Inc., $150,000 in Dock Technologies Inc., and a $250,000 investment in MCT of Wisconsin Inc.
That brings the foundation’s total investments made in 2015 to $1,071,000 and more than $3 million in 22 Wisconsin companies since the start of 2014.
“We are delighted to partner with three different investment groups for these three new deals,” said Tom Shannon, BrightStar’s CEO. “The lead investor in Dock Technologies was Mark Bakken. As his HealthX Ventures Fund starts deploying money in the upcoming months, it will bring another terrific source of capital to the early-stage space. The Wisconsin Super Angel Fund led the MCT offering, and eight private investors and advisor Ted Feierstein of The LeanTech Group were involved with OKANJO’s $1.5-million bridge round.”
BrightStar has accumulated $300,000 in Qualified New Business Venture credits from investments since December, when it became certified as a Qualified Venture Fund. The foundation is seeking individuals and companies in Wisconsin to purchase these credits so that they may be monetized for the non-profit to use for further early-stage investment.
