Shorties Roundup: Arlington’s Monday Properties is using VR to manage online tours

Arlington, Virginia-based Monday Properties is using virtual reality to manage remote building tours.

The local real estate investment firm launched virtual tech platform MondayVR this week with the help of Bethesda, Maryland’s Interface Multimedia, a design and communication company. This launch is the first phase of a robust platform Monday Properties plans to roll out this year. Austin Freeman, executive VP of asset management at Monday Properties, said the company was working on launching MondayVR before the pandemic hit to expand its remote touring opportunities.

“While MondayVR will be incredibly valuable when communities are in different phases of their reopening plans, we intentionally created the platform to be a sustainable and evolving product long into the future that will help us maintain and strengthen relationships with prospective tenants and the entire brokerage community,” Freeman said in a press release.

MondayVR allows users to view properties on their own or with the help of realtors, and they will be able to interact with Monday Properties’ leasing team in real time. The investment firm has been making other tech advances at its properties during the pandemic including the implementation of hands-free tech and digital document signing. Monday Properties manages more than 4 million square feet of office space in Northern Virginia.

Now, for the news shorties from this week, as shared in Technical.ly DC’s daily newsletter:

Wednesday, Feb. 24

• Flourish Ventures, a global VC firm with an office in D.C., has promoted Sarah Morgenstern from principal to venture partner. Morgenstern is based in D.C. and will continue to work with the firm’s national investment team to source and execute deals.
• Class Technologies announced the official release of its flagship software which gives teachers more learning tools for Zoom. The software is now available for Maccomputer users, with releases for Windows, tablets and Androids coming soon. Technical.ly DC named the Michael Chasen-founded startup the most promising tech company in the region on the 2021 RealLIST Startups list.
• There are six Capitol Police officers on suspension and 35 total under investigations following the insurrection on Jan. 6. One of the suspended officers was even seen taking selfies with rioters that day. Read more deets at DCist.

Tuesday, Feb. 23

• Herndon, Virginia-based BlackSky is preparing to go public as part of an acquisition deal with Osprey Technology Acquisition Corp. Check out more deets about the deal here.
• A quarter of Donald Trump’s Facebook posts last year included misinformation of some sort, shocker. The Washington Post surveyed a new report that looks into Trump’s social media activity as Facebook’s independent oversight board is preparing to decide whether to reinstate his account or not.
• Gaithersburg, Maryland-based Altimmune got the approval from the Food and Drug Administration to start clinical trials for its coronavirus vaccine. The local biotech company plans to start trials in the coming weeks.

Monday, Feb. 22

• Jessica Kaing has left 1776 to join Techstars as the accelerator networks’ global startup pipeline lead. She’ll be helping Techstars attract the top startups across the nation to participate in its program.
• D.C.-based political intelligence platform company FiscalNote has acquired UK-based Oxford Analytica, a geopolitical intelligence and advisory firm. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed but here are more deets.
• The D.C. chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union is suing the Metropolitan Police Department for not sharing its stop and frisk data. MPD committed to publishing the data twice a year, but the nonprofit found that it only published this data once in 2020. Check out ACLU-DC’s full complaint here.