The South Africa-founded startup AURA, a life-saving technology platform making emergency response services more accessible and affordable, has raised a EUR13.5 million (US$15.1 million) Series B funding round to fund its expansion into the United States (US) and the development of a global “clearing house” to dispatch emergency response without borders.
Founded in 2017 by Warren Myers, Ryan Green, and Adam Pantanowitz, AURA is a marketplace that enables anyone to access the closest vetted private and public security and medical response unit to their location – anywhere, anytime – using a connected device.
Now headquartered in the Netherlands, the startup will soon be expanding to the US after securing its EUR13.5 million (US$15.1 million) Series B round, co-led by the Cathay AfricInvest Innovation Fund (CAIF) and Partech. This follows AURA’s US$4 million Series A round, secured in 2021.
“This funding marks a pivotal moment for AURA,” Myers, AURA’s CEO, said. “Having built a profitable and trusted presence in the UK and Africa, we’re now ready to take personal safety global. Our mission is to make access to life-saving services seamless, borderless, and available through a single API – empowering individuals and the platforms that serve them.”
The startup has also kicked off its on-demand private security response model in the US.
“Our goals are to make alarm verification faster, homes and businesses safer, and to help law enforcement focus on higher-priority incidents. I’m incredibly grateful to our partners and customers for their ongoing trust – and most importantly, to my exceptional team. Their dedication to our vision of a world where everyone feels safe is the true driving force behind everything we do,” he said.
Patricia Rinke, investment director at CAIF, said as he previous investor in AURA, strengthening CAIF’s partnership via this follow-on investment came as a “natural decision”.
“We trust the team’s powerful vision and extraordinary execution capabilities as it scales its life-saving technology to the US market and across the world. We are equally thrilled to welcome Partech as partners in our joint mission to make emergency response universally accessible,” she said.
