Latest news with #Lehr
Yahoo
13-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Work-Bench's new $160 million venture fund doubles down on New York enterprise tech investing
12 years ago, Jessica Lin and Jonathan Lehr made a bold bet on Silicon Valley venture capital: Most investors were trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. They saw VCs sniffing around the Google and Facebook campuses to find some new startup, which would then inevitably need to find early customers at Fortune 500 companies like JP Morgan. Lin and Lehr had the idea to flip the model of software investing by starting with the customer community, figuring out their pain points, and then finding the best early startups solving that problem. 'We're not trying to buy a lottery ticket to find the next Facebook,' Lehr told me. 'Within the enterprise, you can make it a game of 3D chess.' The natural place to test out the thesis was New York, where a concentration of enterprise software customers is based, so that's where Lin and Lehr started Work-Bench over a decade ago with a $10 million first fund. The bet has paid off. Work-Bench just closed a $160 million fourth fund with the same operating framework as its first, just at a much larger scale, and in a far more mature New York tech ecosystem. 'We figured startups should build near their customers,' Lehr said from Work-Bench's offices near Madison Square Park. 'Thankfully, that has played out.' Work-Bench is one of a crop of venture outfits that helped build the foundation of the contemporary New York tech scene, along with firms like AlleyCorp, Union Square Ventures, and BoxGroup. In the early 2010s, Lehr was working full-time at Morgan Stanley, where he helped bring startups into the bank. After his day job, he hosted an enterprise-focused tech meetup to bring together the 'suits and the hoodies,' as he put it, where a startup's sales development rep could meet a potential customer from JP Morgan over drinks, rather than over a cold call. Lehr and Lin, who was working at Cisco, met through a 'professional arranged marriage,' as she put it. Their first backer, the legacy printing company R.R. Donnelley, introduced them, provided their initial funding, and set them up in a 32,000 square foot office space on 16th and 5th, with the initial idea of creating a startup accelerator. While Work-Bench evolved into a more traditional venture model, that first office became a hub where the firm hosted companies and events—around 200 a year, before the lease ended before COVID. 'OG people in New York will remember that space very fondly,' Lin said. (Work-Bench still hosts monthly events, though usually at other tech companies' offices, like Ramp.) Lin and Lehr attribute Work-Bench's longevity to its laser focus on sales, which is rooted in building community and serving as a connector between corporations and early-stage companies. 'For the startups at pre-seed, and seed,' Lehr said, 'customers are like oxygen, so you're giving them the right intro at the right time, which helps them.' It's also knowing where to roll up their sleeves and help their portfolio companies, such as with the key zero-to-one challenge of building a customer profile and figuring out who to sell to. 'The reality is that you can build a great product, but if you don't have distribution as well, success is going to be very challenging,' Lin said. Lehr highlighted a few wins out of Work-Bench's roster of startups. One, an identity verification company called Socure, grew up in the firm's old office. Work-Bench introduced Socure to Bank of America, which became its first major customer and helped the startup secure more clients and funding. Socure's last round in 2021 valued the company at $4.5 billion. Another seed investment from Work-Bench, the mental healthcare platform Spring Health, was last valued at $3.3 billion in a 2024 funding round. Lehr said that around 50% of Work-Bench's investments are in New York-based startups, with the firm typically focused on leading $2 million to $6 million pre-seed and seed rounds, though it will also do follow-on checks into Series A and B rounds. Despite the continued fear over the liquidity crunch making it harder for venture firms to raise from limited partners, Lehr said that the fourth fund was Work-Bench's smoothest raise yet, largely because of its consistent approach. 'In some ways, we're very boring,' Lin told me. 'If you ask us, what's new, quite frankly, nothing's new.' The caveat, of course, is the rise of AI, though Lehr noted that the hype around adoption has impacted deal sizes and company growth, but not necessarily sales cycles, which is Work-Bench's bread and butter. 'We're still doing exactly what we set out to do 12 years ago,' Lin said. 'It's just enterprise, seed, New York City, go to market.' Leo SchwartzX: @leomschwartzEmail: Submit a deal for the Term Sheet newsletter here. Joe Abrams curated the deals section of today's newsletter. Subscribe here. This story was originally featured on
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Yahoo
The Army wants to use 3D-printed drones to spot threats soldiers can't see
The Army plans to test 3D-printed drones next month during an exercise in Poland to see if the service can mass produce its own small unmanned aerial systems at a much lower cost than the defense industry, Army officials told Task & Purpose. The 2nd Multi-Domain Effects Battalion based in Mainz-Kastel, Germany, has built about seven small drones, which have sensors to scan the electromagnetic spectrum to find targets, like 'The Predator' from the movie franchise, the officials said on Friday. The Task Force will send one or two of the 3D-printed drones to the exercise in Poland to test their ability to help soldiers identify simulated threats, said Lt. Col. Aaron Ritzema, commander of the battalion, which is tasked with conducting long-range reconnaissance missions in the European theater. 'The main way that I see adversaries is through their electromagnetic signature,' Ritzema told Task & Purpose. 'So, a lot of the threat replication that we do — rather than making a cardboard or a wooden tank to go see, really what I want to do is replicate what one of those adversary capabilities would look like in the spectrum.' The drones are designed to look for cell phones, routers, Blue Tooth, WiFi, radars, and other electromagnetic signatures that cannot be detected with a camera alone, said Chief Warrant Officer 2 Chris Lehr, the team lead for the battalion's innovation lab. The ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine has shown both the Army and Defense Department just how important unmanned aerial systems are on modern battlefields, Lehr told Task & Purpose. 'What we know to be true now is that there are never enough of them,' Lehr said. 'There's never enough of them on the forward line of troops. There's never enough of them in production.' The drones are very much a work in progress, Lehr said. The first tests about two weeks ago did not go well, but the lab was able to learn from its mistakes by revamping the drones' frames and making other changes. Subsequently, the lab has conducted more than 10 successful tests. Lehr said the lab is trying to demonstrate to the rest of the Army how soldiers can build small drones for between $2,000 to $3,000, compared with a commercially built quad copter that can cost up to $28,000. Learning how to 3D print the components for the drones has been 'quite a journey,' said Sgt. 1st Class Tyler Baumgartner, the innovation lab's noncommissioned officer in charge. Baumgartner said he had to learn how to get the right quality of print for the drones, and how to make sure the airframe is the right weight and strong enough to fly. 'Everything has been self-taught, through Chief Lehr and I, where we have stumbled upon an issue, and either we sourced to friends and partners for a solution, or we spent a copious amount of hours self-studying to develop a solution on our own,' Baumgartner told Task & Purpose. So far, the most difficult aspect of building the drones has been the lengthy process required to get parts approved by the Defense Department, which also increases the cost of each drone, Lehr said. 'When we say we produced seven aircraft in eight months, at least 90 to 120 days of that was just waiting on paperwork to be completed so we can actually put these things in the air,' Lehr said. While the parts used for the drones are available commercially, they are required to be produced by certain countries, Ritzema said. 'There are some restrictions in terms of where those parts come from that kind of force us to use sometimes the least economically viable solution to actually get that in our hands,' Ritzema said. When asked if that means the lab can't buy parts made from China, Ritzema replied, 'Something like that.' 'Even though we're not doing this at scale or at range that we would in an operational environment, our ability to do this by ourselves in advance of the Army fielding this capability is absolutely foundational to our ability to actually fight this formation in the future,' Ritzema said. Top enlisted leader of Air Force Special Operations Command fired amid investigation The Marine in one of the most famous recruiting commercials is now in Congress 75th Ranger Regiment wins 2025 Best Ranger Competition Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer reenlists in Marine Reserve Air Force pilots get a new way to pee at 30,000 feet
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Yahoo
Personnel Board delays appeal hearings of officers involved in Perkins shooting
Mar. 28—The Personnel Board indefinitely delayed the appeal hearings on the job status of three former and one current Decatur police officers involved in the Steve Perkins shooting. On the advice of its attorney, Richard Lehr, the board voted at its monthly meeting on Thursday morning to place the hearings for Sgt. Vance Summers and officers Joey Williams, Christopher Mukadam and Mac Marquette on hold. Perkins, 35, was shot and killed by Marquette in the early morning hours of Sept. 29, 2023, after a tow truck driver attempted to repossess his truck from his driveway. Marquette and the three officers intervened after an initial confrontation between Perkins and the tow truck driver. Mayor Tab Bowling fired three of the officers and suspended another in November 2023. A grand jury indicted Marquette for murder on Jan. 4, 2024. The four officers appealed their punishments to the Personnel Board as allowed under city employment rules. The rules require the Personnel Board to hold appeal hearings so the employees can fight the terminations and suspension. The officers could get their jobs back and back pay if they win their appeals. However, the Marquette criminal case is continuing before Morgan County Circuit Court Judge Charles Elliott Jr. The judge held a hearing this week on Marquette's effort to dismiss the charges based on stand-your-ground immunity. Elliott had not made a ruling as of Thursday afternoon. The trial is scheduled for April 7 if not dismissed. Elliott issued a gag order in March 2024 that bars the prosecutors, the defendant and attorneys from any extrajudicial communication or release of information about the case. The Personnel Board has ordered three six-month delays of the hearings as it waits on a resolution of the criminal trial. Lehr recommended to the board that it continue the hearings until Elliott's gag order "is either rescinded or modified, so the hearings could proceed." "Our assessment is neither the city nor the police officers could effectively present their case," Lehr said. Board member Darius Crayton said this means the board would have to wait until after the trial, and Lehr said, "That is correct, but it (the gag order) could be modified." Board member Pam Werstler pointed out that the April 7 trial date could be delayed again. Board President Harold Gilmore asked Lehr how the gag order impacts the Personnel Board's plan to hold appeals hearings for the officers. Lehr said the gag order has "such a broad scope that it would be limiting in terms of what the testimony could be." But Gilmore said the Personnel Board's "position is what they're doing across the street (at the Morgan County Courthouse) is entirely different from what we're doing here. That's, I guess, where I get lost at. What they're doing over there — they're looking at a murder trial. We're looking at — they broke the (policies) of the city. I see it different from here and next door." Lehr said there's an overlap in the trial and gag order with the Personnel Board's appeals hearing and the officers' employment, "which is the challenge. If the gag order were not so broad, then we could proceed." Werstler said the board would be looking at what happened before the shooting occurred and if city and Police Department policies were broken. "They're going to be looking at the whole thing; we're looking at this piece, but there's an overlap there," Werstler said. "And if everybody is under a gag order, they can't talk about an aspect of it. There's nobody who can testify. Werstler said she knows "this is not the norm" to delay appeals hearings indefinitely. She said she doesn't want to continue delaying the hearings, but she doesn't see any way the board can hold them right now. "This an anomaly," Werstler said. "We don't want to make a habit of it, but people can't testify on either side, and that's not fair to anybody." Board member Nora Vanderploeg said the board would review the delay and the possibility of holding the hearings if Elliott modifies the gag order. "Any change to it would cause us to meet that next month or sooner," Vanderploeg said. — or 256-340-2432
Yahoo
28-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
PCMI Launches the Global E-Commerce Data Library
MIAMI, FLORIDA / / February 28, 2025 / Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI) has premiered its Global E-Commerce Data Library. Currently featuring data on 35 countries around the world but soon to be expanded even further, the Library features strategic e-commerce data for professionals in payments, online sales, financial services and other sectors. It's part of the global payments market research services that PCMI offers. "While there's lots of e-commerce data out there, it's not often tailored to the needs of professionals trying to uncover revenue opportunities for their companies," explains Lindsay Lehr, Managing Director of PCMI. "That's why we developed the Global E-Commerce Data Library to feature both transactional data showing actual behavior and historical trends over time. Our team also interviewed top e-commerce leaders to understand the market dynamics and shape the Library to offer maximum value for users," she explains. The Global E-Commerce Data Library features e-commerce figures on both mature (Australia, Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan) and developing markets (Bolivia, Indonesia, Kenya, Pakistan, and Vietnam). "Our team is pushing hard to expand the Library's coverage into many more markets, especially in regions such as Asia Pacific and EMEA," says Lehr. However, the Global E-Commerce Data Library isn't designed to be a static data set. "Companies that purchase country data have the option of working with our team to customize the data," explains Lehr. "This means we can expand the data to cover more specific concerns a company may have, allowing for deep dives into e-commerce segments or purchase types or consumer behavior," observes Lehr. Beyond customization, after purchase, all clients are entitled to a free one-hour consultation with a PCMI expert to review and explain the data set. "We added this feature so that we could understand client objectives in purchasing the data and show them its relevance in achieving those objectives," points out Lehr. "Via customization and consultation, we can make the data resonate more strongly with the client's goals and not just be a fixed set of numbers in a file." PCMI's website features more information on the Global E-Commerce Data Library, including methodology, data access and the purchase process. About Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI)PCMI is an advisory group focused on the global payments industry, with over 30 years of experience providing market intelligence to global corporations and has executed over 500 client engagements in the payments industry since 1993. PCMI performs custom strategic engagements including market sizing, opportunity benchmarking, market entry, customer insights, and more, covering over 50 global markets in the Americas, EMEA, and APAC regions. Contact Information Abel Delgado Digital Marketing Directoradelgado@ SOURCE: Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence View the original press release on ACCESS Newswire Sign in to access your portfolio
Associated Press
28-02-2025
- Business
- Associated Press
PCMI Launches the Global E-Commerce Data Library
MIAMI, FLORIDA / ACCESS Newswire / February 28, 2025 / Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI) has premiered its Global E-Commerce Data Library. Currently featuring data on 35 countries around the world but soon to be expanded even further, the Library features strategic e-commerce data for professionals in payments, online sales, financial services and other sectors. It's part of the global payments market research services that PCMI offers. 'While there's lots of e-commerce data out there, it's not often tailored to the needs of professionals trying to uncover revenue opportunities for their companies,' explains Lindsay Lehr, Managing Director of PCMI. 'That's why we developed the Global E-Commerce Data Library to feature both transactional data showing actual behavior and historical trends over time. Our team also interviewed top e-commerce leaders to understand the market dynamics and shape the Library to offer maximum value for users,' she explains. The Global E-Commerce Data Library features e-commerce figures on both mature ( Australia, Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan) and developing markets (Bolivia, Indonesia, Kenya, Pakistan, and Vietnam). 'Our team is pushing hard to expand the Library's coverage into many more markets, especially in regions such as Asia Pacific and EMEA,' says Lehr. However, the Global E-Commerce Data Library isn't designed to be a static data set. 'Companies that purchase country data have the option of working with our team to customize the data,' explains Lehr. 'This means we can expand the data to cover more specific concerns a company may have, allowing for deep dives into e-commerce segments or purchase types or consumer behavior,' observes Lehr. Beyond customization, after purchase, all clients are entitled to a free one-hour consultation with a PCMI expert to review and explain the data set. 'We added this feature so that we could understand client objectives in purchasing the data and show them its relevance in achieving those objectives,' points out Lehr. 'Via customization and consultation, we can make the data resonate more strongly with the client's goals and not just be a fixed set of numbers in a file.' PCMI's website features more information on the Global E-Commerce Data Library, including methodology, data access and the purchase process. About Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI) PCMI is an advisory group focused on the global payments industry, with over 30 years of experience providing market intelligence to global corporations and has executed over 500 client engagements in the payments industry since 1993. PCMI performs custom strategic engagements including market sizing, opportunity benchmarking, market entry, customer insights, and more, covering over 50 global markets in the Americas, EMEA, and APAC regions. 305-441-9300
