Grotech Ventures-backed pgEdge Raises $10M to Drive Growth

Phillip Merrick

Grotech Ventures-backed pgEdge, which helps companies use an open-source relational database management system, has raised $10 million in an investment round led by Rally Ventures, which has offices in Menlo Park, Calif., and Minneapolis.

Arlington, Va.-based Sands Capital Ventures and Owings Mills, Md.-based Grotech, both of whom participated in a $9 million seed round for pgEdge in 2023, also contributed. Based in Alexandria, Va., pgEdge has raised $19 million so far.

Fredrick in Charge

Grotech’s general partner, Steve Fredrick, has overseen the firm’s investment in pgEdge since last year. A 19-year veteran at the firm, Fredrick focuses on investments in software and services, with a particular interest in security and big data. An alumnus of Virginia Tech, Fredrick worked as an engineer with IBM, before founding a software development firm, MartinScott. He was a partner at venture firm Novak Biddle before joining Grotech in 2005. At Grotech, Fredrick manages its investments in software companies such as Caju AI, ChurnZero, Human, Promoboxx and RackTop Systems.

Using its own technology, pgEdge optimizes use of PostgreSQL, aka Postgres, a free and open-source relational database management system known for its extensibility and SQL compliance. Its multi-master replication technology, for example, significantly reduces latency and ensures ultra-high availability for mission-critical applications, enabling wide deployment of the database management system across the globe. According to a Stack Overflow survey this year, PostgreSQL remains the top database choice among developers.

Tapping Ex-Google Exec

Together with the funding, pgEdge named Ben Fried, Google’s former chief information officer, to its board. Fried spent 14 years at Google and prior to that a decade at Morgan Stanley, where he oversaw the financial firm’s web technology platform and led teams responsible for software development infrastructure and business intelligence.

“pgEdge’s strong revenue growth and the onboarding of cutting-edge SaaS and enterprise customers such as the European Parliament, Jobot, Enquire.ai, Qube RT and Kobold Metals underscore our momentum in the market,” said pgEdge co-founder and CEO Phillip Merrick.

Grotech’s 40-Year Path

Founded in 1984, Grotech Ventures has raised over $1.4 billion, and made over 150 portfolio investments, while completing 40-plus exits. It invests between $500,000 and $5 million in cybersecurity, fintech, supply chain, logistics and software startups.

Industry veteran Lawson DeVries has served as Grotech’s managing general partner since 2020. He has been closely associated with a number of Grotech portfolio companies that have been acquired by Cisco and Oracle, among others.

DeVries, who has a bachelor’s degree in English literature from Harvard University and an M.B.A. from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, started his career at Deutsche Bank, where he carried out equity research. He later managed sales at Buckingham Research Group.