On September 25, Cleveland startup Axuall closed a $3 million seed financing round. JumpStart led the round with an investment from our Evergreen Fund, and we were joined by large group of prominent investors including  Zapis Capital Group, M25, North Coast Angel Fund, Kettledrum Ventures and Drummond Road Capital.

Read more about Axuall’s seed round in Crain’s Cleveland Business

We’re excited about Axuall because they have a great solution for a massive problem—the cumbersome process of reviewing and authenticating professional credentials to prove employees possess the credentials required to work in certain professions.  

This problem impacts many different industries, including healthcare (Axuall’s first target market), where many hospitals have entire departments dedicated to gathering, reviewing and verifying physicians’ medical credentials.  

Healthcare systems spend billions of dollars every year to perform this inefficient credentialing process and it can often take 90-120 days to complete for each physician. During this time physicians cannot bill for services, leaving healthcare systems are unable to realize revenue while credentials are being verified.  

So, while healthcare systems like the idea of a more efficient credentialing process they are most excited by the potential to meet patient access demands, grow their service footprint, and increase revenue that comes from a quicker credentialing process.  

Axuall offers both by leveraging the power of blockchain technology to enable a secure network for credential issuers (e.g. medical schools and state license boards) to cryptographically sign and issue digital certificates to clinicians, who in turn can grant their credentials to health systems that require this information to stay in compliance with standards and regulations. The result is a database of digital proofs that can be shared by credential holders and with health systems or any other organizations that require this information. Axuall also provides a payment clearinghouse that ensure that credential issuers get properly reimbursed for their verification services.  

Bottom line, doctors’ credentials will always be up-to-date, ready to present, and aligned with standards, eliminating need for healthcare systems to request redundant information and dramatically shortening the time it takes to hire practitioners and get them working with patients. 

Another reason JumpStart is excited to be investing in Axuall is the team behind the company—a team led by serial entrepreneur Charlie Lougheed. Among Charlie’s notable prior startups are Explorys (acquired by IBM in 2015) and Everstream (acquired by Concurrent Computing Corporation in 2005).  

While leadership from a successful serial entrepreneur is no “guarantee” of future success, founders who have led startups to exits in the past are statistically more likely to do so in the future. It’s not a surprising fact, but it speaks directly to the power of previous experience when it comes to launching a venture, establishing a team, raising money and growing aggressively.  

When you combine a great idea and a large market with a proven team, you have a recipe for a solid investment. That’s why we’re excited to welcome Axuall to the JumpStart portfolio and to be working with the company and our other co-investors to help the company succeed.