o 2U Co-Founder Raises $7.6 Million for Pro Athlete Community
o DC-based Enquire.AI Raises $3 Million in Convertible Round
o NVTC Names 20 New Board Members From Class of 2028
o Herndon-Based ePlus to Sell U.S. Financing Business
o Sabey Breaks Ground on Final Phase of Ashburn Campus
o Arlington-Based CoStar Gains Favorable Ruling in Copyright Suit
o Briefly Noted: Trilliad, CTIA, Mythics
2U Co-Founder Raises $7.6 Million for Pro Athlete Community
Wilmington, Del. – Chip Paucek, the co-founder and former CEO of Arlington-based education technology company 2U, has raised $7.6 million for his newest venture, called Pro Athlete Community (PAC). The Wilmington, Del.-based company bills itself as an education and community platform for current and former pro athletes, providing them access to executive education certificate programs through the University of Miami’s business school, as well as performance coaching and mentorship. Founded by Paucek – who left 2U in late 2023 after 12 years – and player development veteran Kaleb Thornhill, PAC currently counts over 650 current and former pro athletes as clients. The company will use the round, led by GSV Ventures, to launch new virtual education programs.
"The world can be incredibly harsh on pro athletes – holding them to the highest standards while playing, then leaving them without meaningful support, resources, or recognition for everything they've achieved and can still accomplish off the field," said Paucek, who served as CEO. “With the support of GSV Ventures and our new partners, we can accelerate our mission and deliver for the thousands of elite men and women whose pursuit of excellence doesn't stop once the game ends."
DC-based Enquire.AI Raises $3 Million in Convertible Note Round
Washington, DC – Enquire.AI, a DC-based AI research and insights platform, announced that it has raised $3 million in a convertible note round. A group of former research and Wall Street executives led the round. Enquire.AI was founded under the name GlobalWonks.
“Research today is too slow, siloed and reactive to keep pace with the markets. The world moves much faster,” said CEO and founder Cenk Sidar. “We believe the future of research is conversational.”
“We’ve built a hybrid architecture that allows AI agents and top subject matter experts to deliver insights in minutes, not weeks. This funding empowers us to bring that speed and rigor to institutional clients at scale,” he said.
NVTC Names 20 New Board Members From Class of 2028
McLean, Va. – The Northern Virginia Technology Council announced the appointment of 20 new members to its Class of 2028 Board of Directors, who will begin serving on July 1. Greg Baroni, founder and CEO of Attain Enterprises, will serve as chair. The new Class of 2028 board members, who will serve for three years, are listed below:
Srini Attili, SAIC
Irma Becerra, Marymount University
Michael Beckley, Appian
Wallace Christner, Venable
Tony Crescenzo, Intelligent Waves
Greg Fitzgerald, ITC Federal
Maisha Glover, McKinsey & Co.
Ellen Granberg, George Washington University
Maggie Hallbach, Verizon
Laura Ipsen, Ellucian
Anne Kress, NVCC
David Link, ScienceLogic
Sam Maness, Raymond James
Maili Neverosky, Metron
Derrick Pledger, Maximus
Brian Schermerhorn, The Baldwin Group
John Steckel, American Systems
Rick Tossavainen, Dark Wolf Solutions
John Ustica, Siemens Government Technologies
Doug Wagoner, LMI
Herndon-Based ePlus to Sell U.S. Financing Business
Herndon, Va. – ePlus, a Herndon-based provider of technology services, said it has struck a deal to sell its U.S. financing business to New Jersey-based PEAC Solutions. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. “Given the rapidly evolving technology industry, the sale of our financing business gives us incremental capital to focus on growth opportunities and acquisition opportunities in the technology and services space,” said CEO Mark Marron. “It also strengthens our ability to continue to invest in high growth areas of AI, cybersecurity, data center modernization, high-performance networking and related consulting and managed services, while providing us the flexibility to accelerate plans around expanding our footprint and customer base.”
Sabey Data Centers Breaks Ground on Final Phase of Ashburn Campus
Ashburn, Va. – In the latest addition to Loudoun County’s renowned Data Center Alley, Sabey Data Centers said on Wednesday it has broken ground on the third and final phase of its Ashburn campus. The new facility will initially deliver 18 megawatts of leasable power capacity, with an additional 36 megawatts planned for future delivery. Upon completion, it will be the first three-story data center in Sabey’s portfolio, offering a total of 54 megawatts of power capacity. The facility is scheduled to go into service next year.
"Starting construction on Building A marks a significant milestone for Sabey Data Centers as we continue to expand our presence in Northern Virginia," said Tim Mirick, the president of Sabey Data Centers. "This development will create significant additional capacity and room for our customers to efficiently and sustainably scale. "
Arlington-Based CoStar Gains Favorable Court Ruling in Copyright Suit
Arlington, Va. – In a major step toward resolving its 5-year-old lawsuit against a California-based competitor, Arlington-based online commercial real estate company CoStar Group said that a federal judge on Wednesday found that CREXi copied and cropped thousands of its copyrighted images. The case will now move forward to trial to resolve the remaining factual issues and determine damages. A District Court Judge in Los Angeles wrote in his opinion that there is “ample evidence that CREXi and its BPOs [i.e. offshore teams in India] copied listing information, including images, from [CoStar’s brand] LoopNet when a listing could only be found on LoopNet, and that CREXi would take screenshots of photos or otherwise crop out CoStar’s watermarks from photos to build out listings on its website.” CoStar first sued CREXi for copyright infringement in 2020.
Briefly Noted
(Annapolis, Md.) Annapolis-based Trilliad, a provider of technology and services focused on sales, marketing and customer success, has named Sarah Strassheim as its CFO. Strassheim previously served as the CFO at dentsu and global CFO at Merkle, and earlier spent more than a decade at Accenture.
(Washington, DC) DC-based wireless industry association CTIA has named Vijesh Mehta, the co-founder and CEO of San Francisco-based EZ Texting, to its board of directors. EZ Texting is an SMS messaging platform used by more than 230,000 businesses.
(Virginia Beach, Va.) Virginia Beach-based Mythics, an Oracle systems integrator and technology consulting firm, has named James Toole as its senior vice president of consulting services sales. Toole previously served as a group vice president at Oracle, managing the company’s North America consulting sales organization.