Denver, CO – The Angel Capital Association (ACA), the world’s largest association of angel investors, proudly awarded the 2025 Luis Villalobos Award winners at this year’s Summit of Angel Investing in Denver, CO. This prestigious award recognizes the most innovative companies recently backed by ACA member groups. The winners span two categories: Life Sciences, SonoVascular, and Technology, with Givzey’s Version2.ai.
Based in North Carolina’s Research Triangle, SonoVascular is revolutionizing the treatment of blood clots through its proprietary SonoThrombectomy™ system—a novel and highly differentiated ultrasound facilitated, thrombolytic enhanced thrombectomy system that utilizes microbubble-mediated cavitation as a core enabling mechanical mechanism of action to treat blood clots more safely and effectively. The company was nominated by Wolfpack Investor Network. It is a cathlab-based solution designed to maximize the reduction of clot burden, without the blood loss and vessel trauma associated with traditional mechanical devices and without the need to treat patients in the ICU as is required with traditional drug delivery devices. Initiated in 2022 and launched from a joint biomedical engineering initiative between NC State, UNC Chapel Hill, and the University of Michigan, SonoVascular is already in first-in-human trials in Latin America, showing strong early efficacy and safety.
“Our goal is to bring catheter-based therapy into the modern age—merging mechanical and pharmacologic advantages into one safer, more effective system with a superior value proposition for patients, providers and payers,” said Daniel Estay, CEO of SonoVascular. “Winning this award validates not just our innovation but the incredible collaborative science and entrepreneurial spirit behind it.”
Givzey | Version2.ai invents the bleeding edge of nonprofit fundraising technology to help accelerate the missions of the world’s most important and impactful philanthropic organizations. The award-winning company has been supported by original investor Launchpad Venture Group and nominated by North Coast Ventures. Building on the success of its Intelligent Gift Documentation Management Platform, last year Givzey’s Version2.ai introduced the first fully autonomous fundraiser, the Virtual Engagement Officer (VEO), to add trusted digital fundraising capacity to every nonprofit organization. To address severe labor shortage in the nonprofit fundraising industry, the VEO personally engages segments of donors who would otherwise go unmanaged by using relational fundraising that leads to the natural outcome of giving. Autonomous Fundraising is category creating and its rapid adoption and acceleration is changing the future of fundraising and ultimately changing the world.
CEO Adam Martel, a former fundraiser and serial entrepreneur, founded Givzey to solve fundraising’s biggest challenges. “The nonprofit sector faces a universal challenge: there simply aren’t enough fundraisers to personally engage with the majority of the donors who generously provide support to an organization each year. The invention of Autonomous Fundraising directly changes this dynamic by empowering any organization with trusted digital labor that grows fundraising capacity at scale,” said Martel.
ACA is a professional society of angel investors who make up the world’s most prolific early-stage investment class. The association is the largest professional development organization for angel investors in the world deploying more than $650 million in early stage capital each year. ACA provides an insider perspective that can help you make smart investment decisions. The Luis Villalobos Award is named in memory of Luis Villalobos, founder of Tech Coast Angels (now TCA Venture Group) and a passionate advocate for innovative startups. Each year, the ACA honors two companies whose ingenuity represents the future of entrepreneurial excellence in life sciences and technology.
The ACA congratulates SonoVascular and Givzey | Version2.ai for their breakthrough contributions and looks forward to watching their continued impact in the years to come.
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Press Contact:
Dannielle Stewart, Director of Marketing
Angel Capital Association
aca@angelcapitalassociation.org
