Several startups in the Southeast have announced new funding rounds and initiatives this week. Rainforest, based in Atlanta Tech Village, secured $29 million in Series B funding from investors on both the West Coast and Southeast. The company offers embedded payment options for software firms and positions itself as a competitor to Stripe.
TENEX.AI from Sarasota, Florida, raised $27 million in a Series A round. Miami’s Palm Tree Crew completed a $20 million Series A round, while Raleigh-based Swab-Bot raised $300,000 in seed funding. SynXGlobal, a logistics company headquartered in Atlanta, closed a $10 million venture round.
At the 3686 Pitch Competition held at Cannery Hall in Nashville, Folx Table won the $10,000 cash prize. Spikey received the audience favorite award and up to $5,000 worth of services from The Operations Guide.
RevTech Labs Accelerator has started its 23rd cohort for the fall program in Charlotte, North Carolina. The hybrid accelerator includes 11 fintech and insurtech startups from across the country. More than half of these companies have founders who are traditionally underrepresented. Participating startups include Aries Fraud Solutions (Boerne, TX), Clox AI (San Francisco), Drip7 (Spokane), Eleos Life (New York), GoodTrust (San Francisco), GuideAI (Los Angeles), Rake ML (Miami), SnapRefund (Philadelphia), Sonar (Charlotte), Spatial Risk Systems (New York), and Standard Information (New York).
Launch Powered by KPMG Accelerator also launched its second cohort in North Carolina.
Georgia Tech’s CREATE-X accelerator program received the 2025 ABET Innovation Award from the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology.
Venture Atlanta released its list of 86 selected companies for its 2025 event.
Lyft announced it will deploy more autonomous vehicles on Atlanta streets with a new fleet of self-driving cars.
Relay Payments, an Atlanta-based firm, entered into a partnership with Circle K to provide digital payment solutions at over 500 truck-accessible Circle K locations nationwide.
Fulcrum Equity Partners of Atlanta added Scott Mitchell, former CTO of Salesloft, as Venture Partner.
A new FinTech-focused venture studio called Brightlane Labs was launched by Chris Johnson, Barclay Keith, and Managing Partner Alex Han in Atlanta.
Launch Fayette welcomed David Conti and Karen Rands as Entrepreneurs-in-Residence to support local entrepreneurs with their experience.
