Changing the game in their respective fields, all with the support of the Boilermaker ecosystem. That’s what three companies who recently received pre-seed investment from Purdue Strategic Ventures’ Black and Gold Fund and the Minerva Yeung and Boon-Lock Yeo Philanthropic Initiative Fund for Startup Investment all have in common.
Pre-seed funding is a crucial first step for startups to turn their ideas into reality and the Purdue Strategic Ventures team is proud to support Purdue-connected companies at these early, critical stages.
“The Purdue Strategic Ventures team supports venture scale Purdue-connected companies with the resources of the Purdue ecosystem,” said Danielle Salters, principal at Purdue Strategic Ventures. “In this difficult environment for capital-raising, we are excited to announce our investment in pre-seed Purdue-connected companies with strong teams and demonstrable traction addressing large problems aligned with the strengths of the university.”
Explore three companies using the recent investment for a giant leap in innovation.
Aurora Medical
Aurora Medical believes surgery and suturing should be simple and intuitive, with no skin incision. How? They’re solving an unmet need for endoscopists by developing a novel, pre-loaded & reloadable breakaway anchor strip that will redefine endoscopic suturing, agnostic of delivery mechanism including endoluminal (the area inside a tube, duct, or hollow organ in the body) robotics. This will make endoscopic suturing simple and intuitive and enable new endoscopic procedures such as gall bladder drainage.
The Purdue connection: CEO Brian Edge is a Purdue graduate, class of 2005.
The investment from Purdue Strategic Ventures will propel Aurora to exciting new heights, enabling us to achieve key near-term milestones such as advancing product development, conducting pre-clinical studies, and initiating discussions with the FDA. We are thrilled to have Purdue Strategic Ventures joining us on this journey!
Brian Edge
CEO
You should know: Aurora is set to revolutionize surgical suturing with an innovative platform for tissue closure and connectivity across various specialties. Currently, Aurora is participating in Fogarty Innovation’s prestigious accelerator and incubator, located in the heart of Silicon Valley. For more information, please visit our website and follow on LinkedIn. Inquiries, including investment opportunities, can be directed to info@auroramedtech.com
Compact Medical Inc.
One in every five people will someday need CPR. Compact Medical, an Indiana-based company, is refreshing decades-old technology to give paramedics the best shot at bringing cardiac arrest victims home to their loved ones. They’ve created the butterflyBVM, a device that controls the amount of air provided during CPR. Critically, this removes the risk of hyperventilation which occurs in around 80% of cases.
The Purdue connection: Co-Founder and COO, Adam Scott, is a Purdue alumnus who graduated in biomedical engineering in 2018.
Purdue’s recent investment into Compact Medical is helping to push commercialization of the butterflyBVM forward, helping us to submit our product to the FDA this year and likely launching the product in early 2025. Compact Medical has raised about $4.2M to date. A large portion of this funding ($1.7M) comes from SBIR/STTR grants from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and others. The balance comes from investors like Purdue Strategic Ventures. We are thrilled to have such a well-known, influential, and experienced institution as Purdue joining the team.
Dr. Jonathan Merrell
CEO
You should know: Assembly of the butterflyBVM will create high-paying jobs with benefits for women who are escaping human trafficking through our partnership with Hope Center Indy. Follow along on LinkedIn, Facebook, or X to stay updated.
FiberX
The world is searching for sustainable, non-petroleum-based feedstocks for the chemicals industry and an Indiana-based company leveraging Purdue IP has the answer. FiberX is using corn stover, the agricultural by-product from Indiana’s rich corn fields, to produce bioindustrial resins and biocomposite plastics. These resins and plastics have a variety of potential uses across many industries.
The Purdue connection: FiberX is proud of their deep affiliations at Purdue including professors Jim Caruthers and Enrico Martinez, PhD candidate Rajdeep Deka from the Davidson School of Chemical Engineering. Wade Lange, co-founder and Chief Commercial Officer, is a Purdue graduate (BS Pharmacy ‘79 and MSIA 1981) and former Chief Entrepreneurial Officer at PRF.
This investment allowed FiberX to close its initial $1.0 million in funding. These funds allow FiberX to complete its plans to scale corn stover fiber production from our automated pilot plant to industrial scale production at an 800x improvement. We appreciate the persistent support of Dipak Narula of the Office of Technology Commercialization, Purdue Research Foundation, and numerous other departments across Purdue considering the potential uses of FiberX processed corn stover fiber.
Dave Skibinski
CEO
You should know: FiberX is a Gilded Age opportunity as they are starting a new industry, founded in the state of Indiana. They are upcycling the value of corn stover from the state’s corn farms into a new feedstock for chemical products and other industries.
Media Contact: Polly Barks, phbarks@prf.org
