Editor\u2019s note: This article is part of a multimedia series called \u201cTomorrow\u2019s Unicorns: A look inside Raleigh\u2019s $1B startup pipeline,\u201d produced in conjunction with\u00a0Innovate Raleigh. The series aims to spotlight some of the region\u2019s homegrown startups tipped to hit the $1-billion valuation mark, thus becoming a so-called \u201cunicorn\u201d in the language of investors, in the not-so-distant future.<\/em><\/p>\n RALEIGH<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 Three years after ex-Epic Games CEO\u00a0Michael Capps<\/a>\u00a0first launched\u00a0Diveplane<\/a>, a company aimed at \u201ckeeping the humanity\u201d in artificial intelligence (AI), it\u2019s notched a series of big wins.<\/p>\n In just the last year, the Raleigh-based startup landed partnerships with healthcare giants like Duke Health, and the UK\u2019s NHS Foundation Trust and BREATHE, a health data research hub.<\/p>\n It also closed on $3 million in new funding, bringing its total raised to around $10 million to date. It\u2019s even attracted star-studded investors, including US women\u2019s soccer stars Megan Rapinoe and Mia Hamm.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Capps hinted other big deals could be in the works.<\/p>\n \u201cI can\u2019t speak to it yet, but we\u2019re partnered with some cool organizations,\u201d he told WRAL TechWire in a Zoom call. \u201cWe\u2019re lucky to sort of punch above our weight class in the industry, so I\u2019ll just leave it at that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe had a long path of building software,\u201d he added, \u201cbut now that we\u2019ve started commercializing, we\u2019re seeing much better uptake. We\u2019re at that wonderful phase where companies are now calling us.\u201d<\/p>\n While he wouldn\u2019t disclose annual revenue figures, he said: \u201cWe expect to grow 3X in the next couple of months.\u201d<\/p>\n Could his firm be on track to becoming a $1-billion enterprise, otherwise known as a \u201cunicorn\u201d in venture capital circles?<\/p>\n He didn\u2019t rule it out: \u201cWe have significant growth potential.\u201d<\/p>\n Its fastest-growing product,\u00a0GEMINAI<\/a>, creates a synthetic \u201ctwin\u201d data set that enables sharing and analysis of highly sensitive data while protecting an individual\u2019s privacy. The \u201cnew\u201d data is accurate and \u201cstatistically equivalent,\u201d but omits any personal identifiers, like name or date of birth.<\/p>\n The uptick comes as data breaches are on the rise.<\/p>\n Healthcare breaches, alone, have nearly doubled since 2018 and continued to climb through the first half of 2021, according to\u00a0a\u00a0report\u00a0by Critical Insight<\/a>, a Seattle-based healthcare-focused cybersecurity firm.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, more than\u00a093% of healthcare organizations<\/a>\u00a0experienced a data breach in the past three years (Herjavec Group).<\/p>\n And it\u2019s costs big money.<\/p>\n The healthcare industry lost an\u00a0estimated $25 billion to ransomware attacks in 2019<\/a>\u00a0(SafeAtLast).<\/p>\n \u201cData privacy affects us all, and we\u2019re really seeing a shift in the market,\u201d Capps said. \u201cIt\u2019s no longer enough to simply mask or anonymize. Organizations must go further to protect the most intimate of data sets, and that\u2019s what we\u2019re amazing at.\u201d<\/p>\n Diveplane\u2019s AI technology spun out of Hazardous Software, a company founded in 2007 by\u00a0Chris Hazard<\/a>, Diveplane\u2019s co-founder and chief technology officer.<\/p>\n Hazard holds a PhD in computer science from NC State, and worked as a software architect at Motorola and Kiva Systems.<\/p>\n Capps, meanwhile, is a fixture on the local Triangle startup scene. Born in Raleigh, he began his career with post-graduate degrees at UNC-Chapel Hill, MIT and the Naval Postgraduate School. Later, he spent nearly a decade as president of Epic Games, creators of mega-hit Fornite, and one of the region\u2019s early breakout unicorns, a company valued at more than $1 billion. (Today, Epic Games is estimated to be worth\u00a0just shy of $30 billion.<\/a>)<\/p>\n As his LinkedIn profile notes, his tenure included a \u201chundred game-of-the-year awards, dozens of conference keynotes, a lifetime achievement award, and a successful free-speech defense of video games in the U.S. Supreme Court.\u201d<\/p>\n By 2013, Capps decided his time was up. But it didn\u2019t take long for him to sniff out his next venture.<\/p>\n He met Hazard \u201cthrough a mutual acquaintance\u201d on Raleigh\u2019s startup scene, and shared the \u201csame thoughts on the future of AI and the ethical use of data.\u201d<\/p>\n\n
SYNTHETIC DATA<\/h4>\n