Raleigh AI startup ready for growth after $25M raise

Diveplane, a Raleigh-based artificial intelligence company is opening a new office downtown and doubling its workforce.

Driving the news: CEO Mike Capps tells Axios the company has raised $25 million from investors.

• Diveplane currently has around 20 employees. The new hires could be remote.
• The company is in the process of opening a new office in the Smoky Hollow neighborhood in downtown Raleigh.

Driving the news: Founded in 2018 by Capps, the former president of Cary-based Epic Games, Diveplane’s most popular product is a software that creates a "digital twin" of data that companies can use to analyze the data that goes into machine learning algorithms without revealing personal or sensitive information.

• That product has proven popular in industries like health care and defense, Capps said.
• Shield Capital led the round and was joined by Calibrate Ventures, L3Harris Technologies and Sigma Defense.

What they're saying: Capps said Diveplane's mission is to make it easier for companies to analyze and correct the algorithms that are shaping decisions made in the real world.

• "AI is making such consequential decisions," he said. "It's not just video games, not just Windows software. It's helping decide who gets to go to college, who gets parole, who is getting hired."