Portfolio Highlights
Jest, a marketplace for messaging games, recently emerged from stealth with $7m in Seed funding. Leveraging the rise of Rich Communication Services (RCS), which is an enhanced version of SMS, Jest “believes that the future of mobile gaming distribution won’t come from an app store, but rather from within the messaging app.”
Only four months into its beta phase, Jest had already netted over 1 million messaging games played. This round of funding, led by Innovation Endeavors, will enable Jest to scale the platform and onboard the first group of gaming studios.
Congratulations to Deyan Vitanov, Peta Dobrev, and the entire Jest Team!
Congratulations to the Pano AI team on being named to Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies list for 2026! This recognition is a testament to the critical work that Pano is doing at the intersection of climate resilience and artificial intelligence. As wildfires grow more severe and unpredictable, Pano AI's ability to detect fires at the moment they ignite, often before a 911 call is even placed, is changing how agencies respond to wildfires.
Congratulations to Sonia Kastner, Arvind Satyam, and the entire Pano team!
Two of our portfolio company founders have been named to Inc. Magazine 2026 Female Founders 500 List! Congratulations to both on this well-deserved recognition!
Rebecca Liebman, co-founder and CEO of LearnLux, was recognized in the Financial Services category for leading LearnLux’s worldwide expansion and growing its reach to 1 million members.
Adrianne Nickerson, co-founder and CEO of Oula Health, was recognized in the Healthcare & Medical category for advancing maternal health care by driving digital innovation and evidence-based programs.
Blueprint Capital Advisors unveiled the 2026 Power100 Asset Managers I Honorees, with both Maren Bannon and Jennifer Neundorfer making the list. Power100 promotes career development, identification of actionable investment ideas and equitable access to capital while catalyzing change across the entire investment management ecosystem and January Ventures is strongly supportive and committed to championing these values!
Food for Thought
Statusphere’s Kristen Wiley spoke with Net Influencer about why micro-influencer marketing is evolving into enterprise infrastructure and why investors are paying attention.
Goodword’s Co-Founder and CEO, Caroline Dell, was featured in Inc. Magazine sharing the hiring lessons she’s learned while building the company.
Antonio Gracias, the founder of Valor Equity Partners, shares why he’s longing for ‘prenetropic’ startups.
Alan Feld shares how the venture industry is changing as he looks back on 32 years in the technology investment space.
The Vertical AI report 2026 covers annual analysis of 4K+ financings, 250+ exits, and the major trends in Vertical AI.
“The best early-stage founders aren’t just using Claude Code to automate software engineering. Instead, they’re treating AI as a company-wide operating layer.”
Where We Were
Jennifer Neundorfer taught a class in Harvard’s CE11 Course: Creativity and Entrepreneurship - Startups from Ideation to Exit
January Ventures hosted a lunch for GPs and LPs in Boston.
Jen attended the Rock Venture Leadership Dinner at Harvard Business School, an event bringing together founders, faculty, investors, alumni, and leaders from the Rock entrepreneurial community.
Jen attended the Massachusetts AI Coalition Launch Event where Governor Healey announced the State’s partnership with OpenAI (read more here).
Maren Bannon celebrated International Women’s Day over breakfast with an inspiring group of women investors.
Maren attended London Business School’s The Entrepreneurship Lab Unlock event as a Venture Partner.
Where we’ll be
Maren will be speaking at Tech.eu Summit in London on April 21st.
Maren will be attending the Oregon Innovation Showcase and Portland Startup Week.
Jen and Maren will be in Palo Alto in May for Stanford’s Entrepreneurship Summit.
Jen will be in Park City, Utah for Allocate’s Beyond Summit in May.
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