Austin Walne
Investor at Artis Ventures
Nashville, Tennessee
Overview
Work Experience
Senior Partner
2015 - Current
ARTIS Ventures is $535M early stage deep-tech venture firm investing at the convergence of technology + biology (TechBio) and in the digital transformation of healthcare. The firm has partnered with, funded, and supported YouTube, Nimble Storage, Excision Biotherapeutics, Eko Health, Locus Biosciences, StemCentrx, Second Front Systems, Versa Networks, IDbyDNA, Luminate Medical, Modern Meadow, Aruba Wireless Networks, Freenome, and Cohesity among many others, helping them transform major industries. av.co
ARTIS Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in category defining companies in TechBio, the intersection of technology and biology.
Board Member
2024
Luminate Medical is a healthcare technology company that builds devices to make cancer care better for patients by preventing side effects and making at-home treatments a possibility.
Board Member
2024
Activ Surgical's mission is for every surgical imaging system to deliver intelligent information that reduces surgical complication rates, ushering in a new standard of patient care and safety. Their vision is to transform the collective surgical experience by leveraging emerging technologies and data into insights that make world-class surgery accessible for all.
Activ Surgical is a digital surgery company focused on improving surgical efficiency, accuracy, patient outcomes, and accessibility.
Raised $100,400,038.00 from Ronovo Surgical, Mint Venture Partners, Tao Capital Partners, Cota Capital, ATEL Growth Capital, LRVHealth, Alumni Ventures, Rising Tide, Magnetar Capital and Hikma Ventures.
Board Observer
2024
Aether is a stealth mode startup innovating at the intersection of Machine Learning and Synthetic Biology
Aether Bio is a developer of machine learning technology used to re-purpose enzymes in order to create a new compound.
Raised $49,093,616.00 from Natural Capital, Unless, Amplifier and Good AI Capital.
Board Observer
2020
Artis led the first round of financing in 2020 (seed) and has participated in every follow-on financing. Second Front Systems (2F) fast-tracks government access to disruptive, commercially-proven software as a service (SaaS) applications for national security missions. Leading software providers—ranging from publicly traded defense contractors to startups—and global government agencies trust 2F's Game Warden DevSecOps platform and secure cloud hosting environment to accelerate their delivery and harness the cloud revolution at scale.
Board Member
2020
Enklu is a low-code platform that brings the metaverse to life by empowering users to upload, collaborate, and interact with multiplayer 3D experiences for web, mobile, HoloLens and Oculus -in real time.
The mixed-reality marketplace which connects players, creators, and operators of real-world AR/MR experiences.
Raised $6,523,197.00 from Brinc, IrishAngels, LAUNCH, Artis Ventures (AV) and Big Rock.
Board Member
2017
Locus Biosciences is an emerging biotechnology company focused on the discovery and development of a next generation platform for Programmed Cell Death. Our novel approach to precision medicines works by taking advantage of a part of an immune system present in many bacteria called the CRISPR-Cas system. The system protects bacteria from invaders such as viruses by creating small strands of RNA called CRISPR RNAs, which match DNA sequences specific to a given invader. When those CRISPR RNAs find a match, they activate Cas proteins that cut the DNA.
Locus Biosciences develops CRISPR-engineered precision antibacterial platform designed to revolutionize the treatment of bacterial disease.
Raised $118,686,618.00 from Viking Global Investors, Discovery Innovations, Johnson & Johnson Robotics and Digital Solutions, Tencent and Artis Ventures (AV).
Co-Organizer
2012
SF Agile Marketing is one of the largest communities of technical marketers and growth hackers in the country. It has grown from 42 members in Oct '12 and to 4000 members today. We meet each month to discuss topics like growth thinking, customer segmentation, content marketing, and mobile user acquisition. - http://www.sfagilemarketing.com
Registered Representative
2015
FNEX is an alternative investment marketplace connecting accredited and institutional investors to investment opportunities.
Raised $1,000,228.00.
Board Member
2016 - 2017
Stringify was one of the more successful IOT software startups in recent years. Their award-winning service was the #2 "smart home" app on the App Store for most of 2017 and carried a 4-4.5 star rating. Their service allowed users to connect almost anything to anything, allowing them to create unique experiences that matter to them. To support the needs of their heavily connected user base, they had dozens of partnerships that support over 600 products and services including both hardware devices such as Nest, Hue, SmartThings and Fitbit and digital services such as Dropbox, Facebook, Google Traffic and Steam. They were acquired by Comcast in September, 2017 who integrated and evolved the product into their home networking product lines.
Stringify is an Internet of Things (IoT) connection platform startup aiming to shape the transformation of the space.
Raised $6,300,000.00 from SVG Ventures, Artis Ventures (AV) and OurCrowd.