VC Roundup: Get your Switch tickets, Safeguard invests $18 million

Welcome to the VC Roundup, where we’ll parse through venture capital news related to Philadelphia-based private equity firms and the companies they fund. Subscribe to the roundup as an email newsletter. If you have any VC-related news to pass along to us, please drop us a line.
DEFINITE READS
If you read this roundup, then we think you’ll really enjoy Switch, our latest event that has five companies demoing their products for 7 minutes each. So far, Packlate, Orpheus Media Research and P’unk Ave are set to show off their latest and greatest. Come see Philly’s next big thing and snag your tickets today.
First Round Capital has decided to follow on its initial investment of Backupify, a service that backs up cloud computing data. After contributing to the company’s original $900,000 angel round, First Round is one of four firms investing $4.5 million in the Series A.
MIGHT BE WORTH YOUR TIME
Safeguard Scientifics is hosting InvestorDay, an event to help investors learn more about the company. There’s just one problem: the event is in New York. We know, as a publicly traded company, Safeguard must handle some of its business in the 67th Ward. But would it kill New Yorkers if they took a 90-minute Amtrak ride?
Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Northeast Pennsylvania announced $480,000 in new funding today. Most of the companies receiving investment are in the environmental sector.
GIVE A GLANCE
GAIN Capital, portfolio company of Edison Ventures and Cross Atlantic Capital Partners has acquired the foreign exhcange business of MG Financial.
In other Safeguard news, the company recently closed an $18 million Series A round with Good Start Genetics. The Massachusetts-based company develops genetic tests for prospective parents.
It’s an oldie, but it just came across our inbox today. Last year, ChubbyBrain took a look at the business incubation community in Delaware. The most incubated sector? Healthcare.
The Wall Street Journal reports that despite the overall shrinking of the VC industry, many new firms are emerging. We’d guess that it’s because that investments are getting cheaper and cheaper these days.