ABPathfinder recently closed a $400,000 investment round thanks to Omaha-based Dundee Venture Capital, CEO Jeff Blackwood said.
The Overland Park, Kan.-based startup, which aids therapists of children with autism in creating therapy plans via specialized software, raised $270,000 from Dundee in November. In May, as part of the same round, it secured $130,000 from Watson Technology Group and Angel Capital Group.
The company will use the funds to hire software developers and sales representatives in order to focus on the future.
“Provided that we get the momentum that we need,” Blackwood said in a recent phone interview, “this is also going to allow us to move to the next phase of what we’re doing, which is developing practice management for therapy centers.”
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The practice management software would go beyond helping therapists create therapy plans by including billing and invoicing, insurance reimbursement and complex scheduling, Blackwood said.
“The goal is at that point we will be a complete solution for practice management and therapy,” he said.
Blackwood (far left) noted the company is also experimenting with speech and language centers, and brought a new speech pathologist onto its advisory board last week.
Dundee principal Michael Wetta (near left) said his firm invested in ABPathfinder due to the fact that the startup is already on its way to defining itself as a leader when it comes to transforming Autism therapy.
“We jumped at the opportunity to partner with seasoned co-founders with complementary skills in marketing and software development,” Wetta said of Blackwood and his partner, Kelly Kerns, respectively.
“Along with the team, we were drawn to their stage of development,” he said. “With the platform built and rave reviews from pilot clinics it is apparent ABPathfinder is well positioned to define the market and be the leader.”
The funding comes at a promising time for ABPathfinder, whose work was recently affirmed by a pilot study on a therapy center in Tonganoxie, Kan. The study showed that children with autism are gaining skills 17 percent faster by therapy teams using the software.
Blackwood’s hope is to expand the study to a larger population measured over a longer time period.
To learn more about ABPathfinder, see our recent post: “ABPathfinder aims to help therapists, teachers of children with autism“.
Credits: Photo of Blackwood courtesy of Blackwood.
