Boom Supersonic is an airplane manufacturer that is developing supersonic airliners. It aims to kickstart a “supersonic revival”, and its mission is to allow this return of commercial supersonic aviation via the launch of its Overture aircraft, which is still in development. In January 2025, a successful test of its XB-1 demonstrator aircraft, which went supersonic, represented “the first time an independently developed jet has broken the sound barrier”. The flight also successfully demonstrated another technological breakthrough of the company, Boomless Cruise, which will allow supersonic flights to take place over land with no audible sonic boom.

Boom Supersonic is an airplane manufacturer developing supersonic airliners with a mission to allow the return of commercial supersonic aviation.

Boom Supersonic - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Lightmatter is a company that develops specialized chips and chip communication technology, called interconnects, using photonics. By leveraging light for data processing and communication, Lightmatter aims to improve computational power while reducing energy consumption, particularly for AI workloads and data-intensive applications. Lightmatter’s CEO, Nicholas Harris, has stated that “over the next few years, all of the GPUs in the world that are designed for AI training and inference… are going to be built on Lightmatter’s Passage”, its photonic interconnect product to improve data center scale-out while reducing energy requirements otherwise impossible with conventional interconnect technologies.

Lightmatter is a company that develops specialized chips and chip communication technology, called interconnects, using photonics.

Lightmatter – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Cribl is focused on addressing these challenges by providing a more flexible, vendor-neutral platform that enables companies to filter, route, and transform observability data before it enters downstream platforms like Splunk or Datadog. Cribl's ability to reduce data volumes by more than 25% directly addresses the problem of cloud waste, offering measurable ROI through reductions in licensing fees, infrastructure costs, and SaaS charges. By integrating seamlessly into existing infrastructures, Cribl allows enterprises to scale efficiently without overhauling their data systems. As cloud adoption and the demand for more sophisticated data management continue to grow, Cribl’s platform offers a solution that helps companies manage the rising complexity and cost of observability data, positioning it to benefit from the ongoing modernization of enterprise data management.

Cribl’s platform offers a solution that helps companies manage the rising complexity and cost of observability data, positioning it to benefit from the ongoing modernization of enterprise data management.

Cribl – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Automattic is a web development company that focuses on making online content creation and management accessible to a broad audience. Founded in 2005, it operates WordPress.com, which powers over 43% of all websites globally, providing users with tools to easily build and maintain their sites. Additionally, Automattic offers WooCommerce, an ecommerce plugin that enables businesses to sell products and services online from their WordPress websites. Automattic’s mission is to “democratize publishing and commerce”, ensuring that anyone can have an online presence.

Automattic is a web development company that focuses on making online content creation and management accessible to a broad audience.

Automattic – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Originally launched as a microblogging platform for real-time public conversations, X (formerly Twitter) is now aiming to transform into a multifaceted "everything app" under Elon Musk's ownership. Musk envisions X as more than just a social media platform - expanding into payments, e-commerce, and other digital services in a bid to emulate the success of super apps like China’s WeChat. While maintaining its core functionality of real-time communication, X is introducing monetization strategies such as X Premium subscriptions, ad-revenue sharing with creators, e-commerce, and digital payments. These initiatives are intended to reduce reliance on traditional advertising revenue and sustain growth, although challenges around content moderation, user willingness to adopt, and regulatory scrutiny remain significant hurdles as the platform evolves.

Originally launched as a microblogging platform for real-time public conversations, X (formerly Twitter) is now aiming to transform into a multifaceted "everything app" under Elon Musk's ownership.

X – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

OneSchema is an embeddable spreadsheet importer and validator that can automate the process of importing CSV files or excel workbooks with up to 20 million rows, while also validating the data to ensure that formatting is correct and the data is complete. According to the company, OneSchema can automate 90% of the workflow for mapping, transforming, and validating CSV import files.

OneSchema is an embeddable spreadsheet importer and validator that can automate the process of importing CSV files or excel workbooks with up to 20 million rows, while also validating the data to ensure that formatting is correct and the data is complete.

OneSchema – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Secureframe – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Cyera is a data security company that uses DSPM to provide an agentless, AI/ML blended platform, which facilitates quick deployment and instant data discovery across hybrid environments. Cyera uses AI for data classification and contextual analysis to assist enterprises seeking alternatives to traditional, slower-to-deploy methods in managing large datasets while adhering to regulatory frameworks. The company's focus is on automating data governance and improving operational resilience in SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS ecosystems. Cyera’s approach underscores the growing demand for solutions that operate at the scale of modern cloud infrastructure in support of its mission for “every business to realize the full potential of data.”

Cyera is a data security company that uses DSPM to provide an agentless, AI/ML blended platform, which facilitates quick deployment and instant data discovery across hybrid environments.

Cyera – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Replit is pushing forward the usefulness of AI agents in one key category — software creation. Since the beginning, Replit’s mission has been to democratize access to programming by making it more accessible and empowering a billion software creators. Amjad Masad, the CEO of Replit, believes that AI is the unlock to that democratization. As he describes it, “if you can use a computer you should be able to make software.” The Replit Agent is a code generation agent meant to automatically produce an application from an idea expressed in natural language. By removing the barrier of becoming a professional software engineer, Replit can enable the fruition of the original vision of computing — autonomously generated software applications that can perform specific tasks.

Replit is pushing forward the usefulness of AI agents in one key category — software creation. The Replit Agent is a code generation agent meant to automatically produce an application from an idea expressed in natural language.

Replit – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Decagon offers an AI agent designed specifically for enterprise customer support that possesses "human-like" intelligence. The product is focused on being able to reason through deeply nuanced and multi-faceted customer inquiries. The agent itself continuously learns and improves performance over time while it can also autonomously complete actions — like upgrading a subscription tier, setting up a direct deposit account, or processing refunds — on behalf of the end customer. Surrounding the AI agent is tooling that unlocks precise visibility and explainability in how agents make their decisions while enabling all employees, regardless of technical background, to construct custom rules, guardrails, and business logic around the agents.

Decagon offers an AI agent designed specifically for enterprise customer support that possesses "human-like" intelligence.

Decagon – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Metronome provides a usage-based billing platform for companies that seek to deploy a pricing model, precisely measure how much end customers use their products, and apply pricing changes. Such changes can be applied “in minutes”, according to the company. Metronome’s core product consists of a high throughput metering platform that precisely measures customers’ product usage and a pricing engine that allows customers to apply any combination of pricing model(s) on top of the collected usage data. This results in end customers being billed the amount that precisely aligns with their product usage.

Metronome provides a usage-based billing platform for companies that seek to deploy a pricing model, precisely measure how much end customers use their products, and apply pricing changes.

Metronome – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Sword Health is a digital health company offering virtual physical therapy for musculoskeletal (MSK) care. Its mission is to free 2 billion people from pain. Sword Health serves employers and health plans to help their employees and members achieve clinically significant health outcomes for MSK conditions. Sword Health’s platform combines interaction and feedback from physical therapists with its AI monitoring and feedback tool to create personalized, at-home treatment plans for its patients to improve adherence and outcomes.

Sword Health is a digital health company offering virtual physical therapy for musculoskeletal (MSK) care.

Sword Health – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Captions addresses the need for accessible, accurate, and scalable video creation. Initially, the company focused on providing multilingual and context-aware captioning, enhancing video SEO and accessibility while enabling content creators to reach audiences globally on platforms like YouTube and Instagram. Over time, the vision for Captions expanded to become a generative AI video platform, providing customizable AI Avatars as part of a creative platform for generative video. This approach streamlines content production by reducing the learning curve associated with filming, editing, and distributing videos.

The vision for Captions is to become a generative AI video platform, providing customizable AI Avatars as part of a creative platform for generative video.

Captions – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

AcuityMD is a commercial intelligence platform tailored for the medical device industry. It describes itself as “medtech software to drive sales” that “transforms large amounts of healthcare data into intuitive workflows.”

AcuityMD is a commercial intelligence platform for medical device companies.

AcuityMD – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Ramp is a finance automation platform that helps businesses spend less time and money. Unlike traditional corporate card products with complex points programs incentivizing employees to spend more to receive rewards, Ramp’s model incentivizes companies to spend less. 

The Ramp Flywheel is driven by high quality product velocity. Ramp focuses on building quality products and helping customers reduce their spend. Growth (and subsequently revenue) come as a natural extension of that. Their growing revenue base continues to improve existing products and fund new products.

Ramp is a finance automation platform that helps businesses spend less time and money.  Ramp focuses on building quality products and helping customers reduce their spending.

Ramp – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Maven Clinic is a virtual health clinic providing continuous care across fertility, pregnancy, parenting, pediatrics, mental health, and menopause. Maven Clinic works with employers and health plans to offer fertility, family-building, and mid-life employee and member benefits packages. Maven Clinic offers a web and app-based platform that gives its members access to providers from more than 30 specialties and 350 subspecialties, as of January 2025. Through its broad specialty and service coverage and its work with employers and health plans to offer benefits, Maven Clinic intends to create continuity in the care process and reduce out-of-pocket costs for patients.

A report from Contrary Research. Discover Maven Clinic's founding story, product, business model, and an in-depth analysis of the business.

Report: Maven Clinic Business Breakdown & Founding Story

Solv is a digital platform allowing patients to book same-day doctors’ in-person and virtual appointments for urgent care visits. The company integrates video visit capabilities, secure messaging, and patient management tools for healthcare providers to ensure quality healthcare and help grow their practices.  

Solv is a digital platform allowing patients to book same-day doctors’ in-person and virtual appointments for urgent care visits.

Solv - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

The corporate world is seeing a shift in how it recognizes and prioritizes the mental health of its workforce. Access to a range of care is now part of their benefits package across the corporate landscape.  HR departments want their employees to easily access necessary care through digital platforms that improve health outcomes. They are easy to engage with but are also cost-effective and affordable for their companies. The global behavioral health software market is expected to reach $5 billion by 2026.

Modern Health is a mental well-being platform enabling companies to offer therapy, coaching, and self-guided courses in one app. The platform combines the WHO well-being assessment, self-service wellness kits, a network of certified coaches, and licensed therapists available in 35 languages in an app. It empowers employers to lead the charge in acknowledging that mental health is just as important as physical health, destigmatizing the conversation and increasing the accessibility of mental health services. Its digitized care takes advantage of the need for ease of entry and immediate access to resources. Modern Health engages employees across various care modalities, not just high-cost therapy like many incumbent healthcare providers.

Modern Health is a mental well-being platform enabling companies to offer therapy, coaching, and self-guided courses in one app.

Report: Modern Health Business Breakdown & Founding Story

Blockchain.com is a cryptocurrency wallet provider and exchange serving retail and institutional investors. Since 2011, the platform has facilitated over $1 trillion in transactions and, as of February 2024, supported more than 90 million wallets. Competing with major exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase, and Kraken, Blockchain.com offers trading, wallet, and payment services for both novice and experienced users.

Blockchain.com is a cryptocurrency wallet provider and exchange serving retail and institutional investors.

Blockchain.com – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Melio provides businesses with a digital platform to manage B2B payments and accounts receivables. It offers an integrated solution that enables businesses to make and receive payments efficiently to address cash flow needs, reducing late payment fees, and minimizing time spent on administrative tasks. By digitizing payment processes, Melio seeks to help businesses streamline operations, improve financial management, and enhance payment flexibility.

Melio provides businesses with a digital platform to manage B2B payments and accounts receivables.

Melio – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Hippocratic AI is on a mission to build the first safety-focused LLM designed for healthcare. Hippocratic AI provides AI agents who can talk to patients over the phone and handle other patient-facing tasks. The company aims to reduce clinician burden by decreasing or eliminating administrative tasks through AI. In doing so, it can help address the US healthcare worker shortage by augmenting human healthcare workers.

Hippocratic AI is on a mission to build the first safety-focused LLM designed for healthcare to provide AI agents who can talk to patients over the phone and handle other patient-facing tasks

Hippocratic AI – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Arcadia is a climate software and data company that specializes in decarbonizing the electric grid. The company attempts to resolve energy management challenges. They are creating a vertical payment and integration platform for utilities, consumers, and third parties. The company compares itself to Plaid by being the integrator enabling third parties to plug into their customer’s utility accounts and get reliable, clean utility data.

Arcadia is a climate software and data company that specializes in decarbonizing the electric grid. The company attempts to resolve energy management challenges. They are creating a vertical payment and integration platform for utilities, consumers, and third parties.

Arcadia – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Lumafield provides low-cost industrial CT scanners called Neptune and Triton, and a companion browser-based CT analysis system called Voyager. As the global population grows and the required output of manufacturing increases the need for affordable and efficient non-destructive quality control methods will become more important. Lumafield has claimed that it can provide a quality control solution to smaller manufacturers at over a 50% discount to traditional industrial CT scanners.

Lumafield provides low-cost industrial CT scanners called Neptune and Triton, and a companion browser-based CT analysis system called Voyager.

Lumafield – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Radiant builds portable nuclear microreactors that are intended to replace diesel generators in “remote villages” and to provide “resilient backup power for hospitals, data centers, and military installations. The Kaleidos, Radiant’s first product, is designed to produce 1.9MW of thermal power “for facility heating or water desalination”. It is also designed to fit in a shipping container for ease of transport.

Radiant builds portable nuclear microreactors that are intended to replace diesel generators in “remote villages” and to provide “resilient backup power for hospitals, data centers, and military installations.

Radiant - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Skild AI is building a general-purpose brain for robots. It aims to create a flexible, scalable AI platform that enables robots to perform a variety of tasks across different environments. Unlike traditional robotic systems that require task-specific datasets, Skild AI’s model allows robots of any form, humanoid or quadruped, to learn and adapt to new tasks without needing pre-programmed instructions. This AI model is designed to enhance robots’ ability to perform tasks such as navigation, manipulation, and interaction with their surroundings in diverse settings. Skild AI’s solution is particularly aimed at addressing labor shortages in industries like healthcare, manufacturing, and construction, by automating routine or hazardous tasks with affordable, versatile robots.

Skild AI is building a general-purpose brain for robots. It aims to create a flexible, scalable AI platform that enables robots to perform a variety of tasks across different environments.

Skild AI – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Runway is a web-based generative video platform intended to democratize professional video editing by offering a range of AI tools for real-time collaboration. The platform turns traditionally complex and labor-intensive creative workflows into tasks that can be executed faster. By streamlining processes like scene transitions, color grading, and special effects, Runway allows creators, whether individual filmmakers or large enterprises, to produce high-quality video content without relying on expensive agencies or advanced technical skills. The company also describes itself as “an applied research company building the next era of art, entertainment and human creativity” and applies advances from its research arm, Runway Research, to its products.

Runway is a web-based generative video platform intended to democratize professional video editing by offering a range of AI tools for real-time collaboration.

Runway – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Patreon is a platform for digital content creators with loyal fanbases. By offering a membership platform that enables creators to monetize their work directly via subscriptions from their audience, Patreon allows creators to focus on their creativity without worrying about unpredictable ad revenue or platform policies. Creators can have various membership tiers with exclusive content, early access, and other benefits, fostering a sense of community and direct engagement with their audience.

Patreon is a membership platform that enables creators to monetize their work directly via subscriptions from their audience.

Patreon – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

TruckSmarter offers owner-operators a comprehensive platform that addresses both operational and financial challenges. The platform enables owner-operators to discover and book jobs through freight brokers, access nationwide load boards, and take advantage of integrated financial services, such as factoring, banking, and fuel discounts. These tools help drivers maintain cash flow and reduce operational costs, intended to alleviate common financial pressures faced by owner-operators.

TruckSmarter offers a comprehensive platform that enables owner-operators to discover and book jobs through freight brokers, access nationwide load boards, and take advantage of integrated financial services, such as factoring, banking, and fuel discounts.

TruckSmarter – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

KoBold Metals is building a full-stack digital prospecting engine using computer vision, machine learning, and data analysis to find materials critical for electric vehicles and the renewable energy revolution. It is trying to make the discovery process cheaper and more efficient by using ore-deposit science and machine learning algorithms. Using a wide variety of data sources — geologic reports, soil samples, satellite imagery, and academic research papers — the team uses geological science to find potential deposits beneath the earth's surface. The team’s past experiences in academia, investing, and the hard sciences position them well to tackle this complex problem. Rather than selling the software as a product, KoBold Metals seeks to generate revenue by holding ownership stakes in the mineral resources discovered.

KoBold Metals is building a full-stack digital prospecting engine using computer vision, machine learning, and data analysis to find materials critical for electric vehicles and the renewable energy revolution.

KoBold Metals – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Achieving commercial viability is the next challenge for fusion technology. Helion, a Washington-based fusion research company that aims to be the “first to fusion,” is among the companies leading the charge. In 2021, Helion CEO Dr. David Kirtley proclaimed that Helion’s mission would be “to build and deploy low-cost energy for the whole world. The rest of the universe is powered on fusion, and I believe we can do it too.” 

Having created seven prototypes in less than 10 years, Helion is one of the fastest-moving companies in the space. The company uses a different fusion technique than competitors, which it believes will reduce the risk of radiation and increase efficiency. The unique molecular composition utilized by its reactor is purported to enable the direct capture of energy through the charged particles of the fusion reaction, as opposed to relying on the cycle of using heat to turn water into steam, which can power a turbine.

Helion, a Washington-based fusion research company that aims to be the “first to fusion,” is among the companies leading the charge for commercial viability.

Helion Energy – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Foundry provides compute on-demand, offering users access to NVIDIA’s most advanced GPUs, renowned for their exceptional performance in complex computational tasks. These GPUs can be leveraged for a variety of use cases, including fine-tuning machine learning models, training large-scale AI systems, and running inference operations with high efficiency. Users have the flexibility to reserve compute resources for periods ranging from a few days to several weeks, enabling them to harness elite processing power tailored to their project timelines. This model delivers a cost-effective solution for scaling intensive workloads without the need for long-term infrastructure investments.

Foundry provides compute on-demand, offering users access to NVIDIA’s most advanced GPUs, renowned for their exceptional performance in complex computational tasks.

Foundry – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Redwood Materials recycles lithium-ion batteries from EVs and consumer electronics in order to extract anode and cathode components, refine them into reusable material, and repurpose them for battery cell production by US auto manufacturers. This allows auto manufacturers to accelerate production and meet demand, decreases reliance on foreign supply chains, and reduces costs and emissions related to mining and the transportation of metals.

Redwood Materials recycles lithium-ion batteries from EVs and consumer electronics in order to extract anode and cathode components, refine them into reusable material, and repurpose them for battery cell production by US auto manufacturers.

Redwood Materials - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Base Power aims to become the “modern power company of the electric era” by offering its customers a reliable and affordable home energy service powered by a network of batteries. Base provides its customers with a home battery, monthly energy service, and installation — all without requiring a solar installation. Base’s strategy is to start on the demand side, addressing grid bottlenecks, and eventually vertically integrate into energy. With enough customers and batteries, Base can optimize energy production, storage, and distribution, cutting out middlemen and lowering prices.

Base Power aims to become the “modern power company of the electric era” by offering its customers a reliable and affordable home energy service powered by a network of batteries.

Base Power – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Go1 provides a curated online learning library comprised of content from training providers across dozens of categories, such as industrial skills, health & safety, legal, mental health, time management, and more. The goal is to allow customers to more easily integrate Go1 with platforms they already use, such as Workday, Rippling, and ADP in order to deliver training programs to their employees.

Go1 provides a curated online learning library comprised of content from training providers across dozens of categories, such as industrial skills, health & safety, legal, mental health, time management, and more.

Go1 – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Headway has created a platform that connects patients, therapists, and insurance companies in the mental health ecosystem. Headway makes it easy for therapists to accept insurance coverage by offering claims management administrative support, payments, and scheduling. Headway improves the patient experience by allowing patients to search for therapists who best fit their needs, book appointments directly online, and get visibility into the costs they will be responsible for as part of their treatment. Insurance companies partner with Headway to increase access and quality for their health plan networks.

Headway has created a platform that connects patients, therapists, and insurance companies in the mental health ecosystem.

Headway – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Optimizely, branded as an “all-in-one operating system for marketing”, is a platform that includes a suite of AI-powered tools to help teams manage their digital content and optimize digital experiences. It helps businesses improve their customer experiences by allowing them to test variations of their web pages, user interfaces, or content to see what performs best. It further enables businesses to deliver tailored experiences to individual users based on their behavior, preferences, and real-time data.

Optimizely, branded as an “all-in-one operating system for marketing”, is a platform that includes a suite of AI-powered tools to help teams manage their digital content and optimize digital experiences.

Optimizely – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

ElevenLabs offers an AI-powered voice generation platform that addresses the critical industry pain points of quality, trust, and reliability. By employing voice cloning algorithms, ElevenLabs enables creators and businesses to produce personalized audio content at efficient speed and scale. Its technology reduces time-to-market and operational costs but also opens doors to possibilities across media, entertainment, education, and customer service.

ElevenLabs offers an AI-powered voice generation platform that addresses the critical industry pain points of quality, trust, and reliability.

ElevenLabs – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Carta was built as a platform to manage a company’s cap table and has expanded to address the broader suite of needs in managing an organization’s financial and operational complexity. The company has accumulated an extensive network of venture-backed startups and venture investors. As of February 2023, 95% of startups choose Carta as their cap table management software.

Carta was built as a platform to manage a company’s cap table and has expanded to address the broader suite of needs in managing an organization’s financial and operational complexity.

Carta - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Before Docker's introduction, containers (process isolation) were a concept that had been around for some time, particularly in the Linux ecosystem. Linux containers use kernel features like cgroups (control groups) and namespaces to manage system resources and provide process isolation. However, container management often required a deep understanding of Linux internals and command-line tools. Technologies like Linux Containers provided the foundational capabilities but needed to be more user-friendly, making it difficult for developers without extensive system administration experience to leverage them effectively. As a result, container technology adoption was greatly accelerated when Docker introduced an open-sourced Docker Engine in 2013. Docker Engine set a new standard for container use with easy tools for developers and defined a universal approach for how containers should be packaged.

Docker introduced an open-sourced Docker Engine in 2013 that set a new standard for container use with easy tools for developers and defined a universal approach for how containers should be packaged.

Docker – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Clipboard Health aims to address healthcare staff shortages with a two-sided marketplace connecting healthcare professionals with understaffed facilities. Healthcare professionals can browse open shifts posted by facilities based on location, pay rate, and timing to find the best match for their needs. This flexibility allows them to work on their own schedules and take time off, which can help curb burnout. As of January 2025, the platform served tens of thousands of healthcare professionals and collaborated with over 1K healthcare facilities.

Clipboard Health aims to address healthcare staff shortages with a two-sided marketplace connecting healthcare professionals with understaffed facilities.

Clipboard Health – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

LangChain is an open-source orchestration framework for the development of AI applications using LLMs. It offers tools for developers to orchestrate components, build flexible control flows, and gain visibility into development cycles for AI application development. Overall, LangChain’s tools and APIs simplify the process of building LLM-driven applications like chatbots and virtual agents. 

LangChain is an open-source orchestration framework for the development of AI applications using LLMs.

LangChain – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Lookout is a cybersecurity company specializing in mobile endpoint security and cloud security solutions for enterprises. Its product offerings include Mobile Endpoint Security, Threat Intelligence, and a Security Service Edge (SSE) platform. Leveraging one of the world's largest mobile security datasets, Lookout provides advanced threat detection and protection for over 2K enterprise customers as of December 2024, including major telecommunications companies and large tech companies.

Lookout is a cybersecurity company specializing in mobile endpoint security and cloud security solutions for enterprises.

Lookout – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Tecton provides a feature platform for machine learning with a unified system for defining, managing, and serving features. The platform empowers data scientists to own model deployment and integration, much like how DevOps practices revolutionized software engineering two decades ago, enabling 208 times more frequent and 106 times faster deployments. Tecton's approach goes beyond traditional feature stores, incorporating data pipelines and infrastructure typically built by data engineers. It acts as a central repository for business signals, enabling teams to discover, re-use, and govern features. By integrating with existing data infrastructure like Snowflake, Databricks, and AWS, Tecton aims to provide a best-of-breed solution rather than requiring migration to an end-to-end ML platform.

Tecton provides a feature platform for machine learning with a unified system for defining, managing, and serving features.

Tecton - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Together AI aims to address the needs of enterprises seeking AI infrastructure that is cost-effective, transparent, and secure. It provides a decentralized platform connecting users to a network of high-end GPU chips. This platform allows users to run open-source AI models without reliance on traditional cloud services. Together AI offers a full-stack product suite that empowers the open-source community so customers don’t have to spin up their infrastructure.

Together AI aims to address the needs of enterprises seeking AI infrastructure that is cost-effective, transparent, and secure.

Together AI – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Hallow is a Catholic prayer and meditation app that provides a convenient and accessible platform for integrating prayer and mindfulness into daily life. The app attempts to foster a sense of connection and shared purpose among its users worldwide through guided meditations, daily scripture readings, and community challenges. With over a billion Catholics globally, Hallow addresses a significant opportunity to modernize faith engagement by offering a more accessible and contemporary way to connect with longstanding traditions. Rather than replacing the traditional church institution, Hallow is intended to complement them, aligning its offerings with Catholic practices to make faith-based routines more adaptable to today’s fast-paced lifestyles.

Hallow is a Catholic prayer and meditation app that provides a convenient and accessible platform for integrating prayer and mindfulness into daily life.

Hallow – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Superhuman is an email client designed to boost productivity and help users manage their inboxes more efficiently. Its primary goal is to enable users to achieve inbox zero, where no emails are sitting in a user’s inbox, by providing a streamlined email experience. Initially launched in 2017 as an invite-only platform, Superhuman has since gained popularity for its speed and efficiency. According to a 2021 survey by Superhuman, 30% of remote workers identified work-related communications as their biggest distraction. Superhuman addresses this challenge by reducing the time users spend on email, enabling them to focus on more productive tasks. The company claims its email client is three times faster than Gmail, saves users over four hours per week, and improves response times by an average of two days.

Superhuman is a client that powers up user inboxes to help users become more productive and triage emails more efficiently.

Superhuman - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Boston Metal is developing a cleaner process to create steel through its Molten Oxide Electrolysis (MOE) technology, which uses renewable electricity to produce steel without emitting carbon dioxide. This technology eliminates the need for traditional, carbon-intensive processes, significantly reducing the environmental footprint of steel production. By offering a cost-effective and zero-emission solution, Boston Metal addresses regulatory pressures and market demand for the production of green steel, which has been defined as steel manufactured without the use of fossil fuels.

Boston Metal is developing a cleaner process to create steel through its Molten Oxide Electrolysis (MOE) technology, which uses renewable electricity to produce steel without emitting carbon dioxide.

Fivetran – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Otter is an AI-powered transcription and collaboration tool designed to address these challenges. Otter's platform transcribes spoken words into text and at the same time, identifies speakers, summarizes key points, and allows users to highlight and comment on specific parts of the transcript. This improves collaboration among team members, especially in remote settings. By integrating with popular virtual meeting platforms like Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet, Otter is designed to fit into existing workflows.

Otter is an AI-powered transcription and collaboration tool that transcribes spoken words into text and at the same time, identifies speakers, summarizes key points, and allows users to highlight and comment on specific parts of the transcript.

Otter – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Squire is building an all-in-one platform tailored to barbershops. Beginning with a booking management system coupled with a point of sales system, Squire has evolved into an end-to-end solution including other products like inventory management, CRM and finance.

Squire is building an all-in-one platform tailored to barbershops.

Squire - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Measuring forest carbon capture is difficult due to a lack of reliable data. This makes it hard to determine whether current forest conservation projects are effectively reducing emissions. To address this and modernize the forest carbon market, Pachama has developed a carbon credits marketplace and monitoring software to assess projects' impacts. It uses satellite imagery, LiDAR imaging, and remote sensing to measure the carbon stored in forests over time and detects changes to the forest events like illegal logging. Pachama shares insights from this monitoring with both carbon offsetters and project developers. Pachama believes that the best way to reduce emissions is by protecting and restoring forests through the sale of carbon credits to businesses and consumers. Pachama’s goal is to restore 100 million hectares of forest by 2030.

Pachama has developed a carbon credits marketplace and monitoring software to verify the real impact of forest restoration projects.

Pachama – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Equitybee is a platform that helps private company’s employees access the funding they need to exercise their stock options by connecting them with investors. Investors provide the funding for employees at discounted costs of equity and share any potential profits if the company has a successful liquidation event. Equitybee allows employees to capitalize on their equity with low risks of funding, while investors gain access to high-growth opportunities typically unavailable to them.

Equitybee is a platform that helps private company’s employees access the funding they need to exercise their stock options by connecting them with investors.

Equitybee – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Ripple proposes an alternative to expensive and time-inefficient international money transfers. Ripple cuts out intermediary banks and enables the sending and receiving banks to communicate directly, exchanging fiat using a cryptocurrency token, XRP. Using Ripple, transactions happen within 3-5 seconds, cost less than one cent, and are publicly available on its native blockchain ledger, reducing the additional management costs of tracking and reconciling payments. Additionally, it utilizes a credit and debit system via its cryptocurrency wallets, removing the need for banks to lock up liquidity to conduct a transaction.

Ripple proposes an alternative to expensive and time-inefficient international money transfers by cutting out intermediary banks and enabling the sending and receiving banks to communicate directly, exchanging fiat using a cryptocurrency token, XRP.

Ripple – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Moveworks uses AI to automate workplace support tasks, helping companies resolve employee issues like IT or PTO questions without having to rely on employees. Its AI Copilot integrates with dozens of apps that employees may already use like Slack and Microsoft Teams so they can get their questions answered instantly, without interrupting their workflows. As of October 2024, Moveworks serves over 350 enterprise customers including Salesforce, Palo Alto Networks, Pinterest, and DocuSign.

Moveworks uses AI to automate workplace support tasks, helping companies resolve employee issues like IT or PTO questions without having to rely on employees.

Moveworks – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Founded in 2017, CoinTracker is one of the earliest movers in the crypto tax and portfolio space, creating products that make it easy for nontechnical users to track their portfolio and generate tax forms for their crypto investments. By supporting the latest crypto asset derivatives and providing guidance for new crypto regulations, CoinTracker helps retail and institutional investors monitor their portfolios and maintain tax compliance.

CoinTracker is one of the earliest movers in the crypto tax and portfolio space, creating products that make it easy for nontechnical users to track their portfolio and generate tax forms for their crypto investments.

CoinTracker – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Medable is a SaaS company that provides a global cloud platform with a range of modules designed to support the DCT process and help researchers conduct remote screenings, patient monitoring for trials, give digital consent, provide outcomes assessments, and conduct telemedicine visits. Using its AI-powered platform in electronic clinical outcomes assessment (eCOA) deployments, Medable streamlines and automates manual tasks, provides analytical insights, and speeds up the trial process for a faster time to market. As of October 2024, it has launched in 60 countries, and clinics that are customers have seen 200% faster enrollment and 50% cost reductions.

Medable streamlines and automates manual tasks, provides analytical insights, and speeds up the clinical trial process for a faster time to market.

Medable – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Vannevar Labs was founded to solve the problem of inefficient traditional methods of collecting intelligence and data. Vannevar Labs seeks to improve intelligence-gathering efforts by developing AI and ML solutions and enhancing data analysis. Vannevar Labs' flagship product, Decrypt, is a foreign text workflow platform that helps intelligence officers find patterns and insights in vast amounts of battlefield information, translate foreign languages, and search for key documents. The company was named after Vannevar Bush, an American engineer and science administrator who played a key role in the development of the Manhattan Project and the creation of the National Science Foundation. 

Vannevar Labs seeks to revolutionize intelligence gathering by developing advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning solutions that enhance data analysis.

Vannevar Labs - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Hebbia was founded to provide neural search functionality for investment banking and private equity analysts so they could solve queries that were complicated and ambiguous. Its core product, Matrix, enables users to upload any type of document, including PDFs, presentations, emails, and images, to specify questions they’d like answered across each document and instantly provides detailed insights in a tabular format similar to Microsoft Excel. The company began in financial services and was being used by 30% of the top 50 asset managers by AUM as of July 2024. It seeks to become an enterprise search solution for knowledge workers in highly regulated industries in which decision-making speed and accuracy are crucial.

Hebbia has positioned itself as the enterprise search solution for knowledge workers in highly regulated industries in which decision-making speed and accuracy are crucial.

Hebbia – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Epirus was founded to leverage technological breakthroughs, providing innovative and cost-effective counter-UAS solutions. By harnessing advancements in semiconductor technology and HPM systems, Epirus aims to bridge the gap between the escalating drone threat and the need for efficient defenses in modern warfare. Unlike traditional HPM technology, which was bulky and required extensive human operation, modern systems like Epirus's Leonidas are more versatile and can neutralize multiple drones simultaneously without causing collateral damage. These advancements address the limitations of previous technologies and offer a scalable means to counter the growing threat of drone swarms.

Epirus harnesses advancements in semiconductor technology and HPM systems, aiming to bridge the gap between the escalating drone threat and the need for efficient defenses in modern warfare.

Epirus – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Perplexity, also known as Perplexity AI, is an AI-powered, conversational search engine that answers queries using natural language predictive text utilizing sources from around the internet. Perplexity performs real-time web searches to gather the most current information available across the Internet. Then, it summarizes the information in a cited format, using LLMs mainly only to preprocess the questions and summarize search results, which is intended to deliver up-to-date and well-sourced information. Perplexity describes itself this way: “unlike traditional search engines that present a list of links, Perplexity delivers synthesized information in a natural language format, complete with citations and follow-up suggestions for more refined searches.” The company’s mission is to “serve the world’s curiosity”.

Perplexity, also known as Perplexity, is an AI-powered, conversational search engine that answers queries using natural language predictive text utilizing sources from around the internet.

Perplexity - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Plastiq is an intermediary payments platform that transforms a credit card payment into an invoice payment so that people can use credit cards anywhere, anytime. More specifically, Plastiq charges a flat 2.85% fee before the transaction for the customer to convert a credit card payment to an ACH, check, or wire transaction. Plastiq allows customers to use any card in places where they normally wouldn’t be accepted, while still retaining access to the convenience, rewards, and cash flow offered by their existing credit card.

Plastiq is an intermediary payments platform that transforms a credit card payment into an invoice payment so that people can use credit cards anywhere, anytime.

Plastiq – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Character.AI is an AI-powered entertainment and companionship platform. It allows users to create and interact with AI characters that have distinct personalities and backgrounds. At its core, Character.AI utilizes an AI model for conversational interactions, aiming to blend the informational utility of chatbots, like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, with engaging social experiences. Its AI model is optimized specifically for conversational engagement, using LLMs similar to those found in ChatGPT, but with an added focus on creating natural, emotionally resonant conversations. Unlike chatbots focused on transactional or information-driven tasks, Character.AI aims to provide an immersive experience, making conversations feel more like interacting with a real companion. The AI model learns from user interactions, continuously improving its ability to respond in a human-like manner, and is versatile to handle casual chats or meaningful discussions.

Character.AI is an AI-powered entertainment and companionship platform.

Character.AI – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Vendr is a SaaS buying & management platform that helps companies find, buy, and manage their software stack.

Vendr – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

The NFT marketplaces play an important role in the digital economy, allowing creators and collectors to showcase, discover, and transact NFTs. The global non-fungible token market is expected to reach $211.7 billion by 2030. However, the NFT space is still relatively new. Users often encounter fragmented ecosystems, high transaction fees, and bugs, resulting in barriers to entry and limiting the market's growth.

Magic Eden is an NFT marketplace initially focused on digital collectibles in the Solana blockchain, designed to address the challenges faced by traditional NFT platforms. By leveraging the Solana network's high throughput, low latency, and low-cost transactions, Magic Eden offers creators and collectors a fast and affordable NFT trading experience.

Magic Eden is an NFT marketplace initially focused on digital collectibles in the Solana blockchain, designed to address the challenges faced by traditional NFT platforms.

Magic Eden – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Drata provides a solution for startups to automate evidence collection and tests, manage multiple frameworks simultaneously without added effort, and achieve continuous compliance. Drata is intended to enable companies to more easily maintain compliance standards via automation so they can dedicate more of their time, energy, and focus on their core product.

Drata provides a solution for startups to automate evidence collection and tests, manage multiple frameworks simultaneously without added effort, and achieve continuous compliance.

Drata - Contrary Research Company Profiles and Resources

Citizen is a digital safety network that leverages real-time information on crimes to increase the public’s awareness of safety issues. The app provides real-time 911 alerts and allows users to contribute toward resolving situations by broadcasting live videos and sharing relevant updates. This kind of crowdsourced crime reporting is intended to foster transparency by filling the gap left by traditional news outlets and providing users with immediate, accurate information about safety issues in their surroundings. In a world where crime is a persistent problem, Citizen seeks to offer a timely, crowd-sourced, approach to safety by integrating technology and community involvement.

Citizen is a digital safety network that leverages real-time information on crimes to increase the public’s awareness of safety issues.

Citizen - Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

Lacework is a cloud security services provider that automates cloud security at scale so customers can innovate with speed and safety. Lacework delivers native cloud infrastructure compliance and security for DevOps, workloads, and cloud containers. They continuously and automatically monitors your environment so companies do not need to create or edit policies or algorithms. Lacework provides the ability to scan, identify, and report vulnerabilities found in the operating system of cloud workloads. 

Lacework is a cloud security services provider that automates cloud security at scale. Lacework delivers native compliance and security for DevOps, workloads, and cloud containers.

Lacework – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

The 2010s saw the rise of neobanks, also known as digital banks or challenger banks, in the United States. Neobanks offer various financial services from checking and savings accounts to loans and debit cards. Neobanks often have lower fees and minimum balance requirements than traditional banks, making them more accessible to more people, especially lower income Americans that are unbanked or underbanked. Moreover, neobanks typically aim to make banking simple and convenient for customers with easy-to-use apps.

Chime is a neobank that provides consumer banking services through its mobile app. It started as a mobile banking app that offered no-fee bank accounts, debit cards, and a way to get paychecks two days in advance. It has since added several other offerings to become a comprehensive banking product suite for its younger, millennial audience.

Chime is a neobank that provides consumer banking services through its mobile app.

Chime – Contrary Research Company Profile & Resources

OpenSea is a cryptocurrency Ethereum-focused non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace where anyone can create, sell, and buy NFTs. NFTs are unique and non-fungible digital items stored on the blockchain. During the second half of 2021, roughly ~85% of all non-fungible tokens (NFTs) marketplace transactions were happening on OpenSea. NFT buyers, sellers, and traders increased the volume of OpenSea in 2021 to over $14 billion.

OpenSea | Contrary Research

Pulley is an equity management solution that serves more than 5K companies as of October 2024, offering a comprehensive suite of products that includes fundraising modeling, 409As and compliance, and equity issuance. Pulley’s cap table management solution provides founders with a comprehensive view of their companies’ current equity structure, accounting for external investors and complex employee vesting schedules, and its scenario modeling tools allow founders to project potential cap table scenarios stemming from future fundraising rounds. 

Pulley is an equity management solution that serves more than 5K companies as of August 2024, offering a comprehensive suite of products, including fundraising modeling, 409As and compliance, and equity issuance.

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