Standout of the week
ReFiBuy.ai
Raleigh agentic-commerce optimization platform
Closed a $13.6M oversubscribed seed round.
ReFiBuy was founded in February 2025 by Scot Wingo, Derek Conlin, Cameron Bowe, and James Frawley, all ChannelAdvisor alumni. The round was led by NewRoad Capital Partners and follows a $1.7M launch round from March 2025. The intake captures the company at roughly 20 employees in downtown Raleigh, with plans to hire about 10 more.
What you should know
ReFiBuy.ai closed a $13.6M seed round led by NewRoad Capital Partners, with Ridge Ventures, Silicon Road Ventures, Incubate Fund, VELA Partners, G20 Ventures, Commerce Ventures, Knoll Ventures, and retail-industry angels in the round.
Swarm, a Chapel Hill AI persona-based user-testing platform, surfaced as a directory candidate with more than $100K reported from Leap Year and Afore Capital.
The ReFiBuy intake also staged NewRoad as an out-of-state but on-thesis lead investor for retail, supply chain, and commerce infrastructure.
Moment
Swarm
A UNC student team became a company candidate.
Swarm sits outside the strict scan window, but the May 5 routine staged it because the earlier GrepBeat profile had not been captured. The useful part is the product claim: AI-generated personas that click through products, enter information, and flag friction before a human research panel gets involved.
Deep dives
Capital
2 rounds
The disclosed capital in this scaffold is concentrated in one round. ReFiBuy's $13.6M seed is large enough to stand on its own. Swarm's reported $100K-plus pre-seed is included as a floor because the GrepBeat article did not provide an exact amount.
Seed
ReFiBuy.ai
$13.6M
Lead: NewRoad Capital Partners
With: Ridge Ventures, Silicon Road Ventures, Incubate Fund, VELA Partners, G20 Ventures, Commerce Ventures, Knoll Ventures
Oversubscribed seed round. Use of funds: expand sales, marketing, and engineering.
Pre Seed
Swarm
$100K
With: Leap Year, Afore Capital
Reported as more than $100K. The amount is represented as a floor, not an exact round size.
Infrastructure
The notable infrastructure read is capital fit: ReFiBuy's lead investor comes from a supply-chain and retail thesis, which is closer to the buyer market than a generic local seed fund would be.
Coming up
May 14
NC IDEA SEED Spring recipients expected
The next scaffold closes the finalist watch with the final grant list.