Atlas Make investments, which has developed a digital platform permitting actual property builders to lift capital and loans from traders, has been voted by “Globes” readers as their favourite startup, as a part of the Globes Most Promising Startup Rankings for 2025. In second place was Port.io, which has developed an inner developer portal and platform for software program builders, and in third place was cybersecurity firm Zero Networks, which helps corporations cope hackers on enterprise networks, primarily in stopping ransomware assaults.
Some 6,000 “Globes” web site readers participated within the ballot over the previous week, which included 30 progress stage startups. Different corporations within the ballot embrace: cloud backup firm EON, which has turn out to be a sensation with traders; Asterix, the cybersecurity firm for AI brokers; AI-based programming engine Qodo; hospital cost system PayZen; and Agora, which offers a fintech answer for actual property investments, from the angle of managing joint investments in belongings.
Atlas Make investments’s story started virtually by chance. Roni and Nir Peled, father and son, veteran builders in Israel’s actual property sector, started receiving sudden inquiries from actual property builders within the US, in search of financing for initiatives. “At first, they did not perceive why they have been being approached,” says Tal Shahar, the CEO and third associate. “However slowly the image grew to become clearer – the banks are merely not serious about dealing with small, short-term loans, as a result of the working prices are too excessive for them.”
The necessity that these builders recognized, together with the shortage of response from banks, grew to become a possibility. Shahar, who comes from a know-how and funding background, with a level in pc science and entrepreneurship, expertise in founding a earlier startup and a partnership within the enterprise capital fund Deep Perception, the place he’s nonetheless energetic immediately, joined the Peleds.
On the finish of 2022, they based Atlas Make investments to develop a platform that will join institutional traders and actual estate-backed loans – exactly the place the normal market has problem working.
At the moment, simply three years after it was based, the corporate has workplaces in New York and Tel Aviv, 24 staff – most of them in Israel – and has up to now brokered transactions value greater than $60 million by means of its platform, in line with the entrepreneurs.
The corporate doesn’t grant the loans itself, however fairly offers institutional entities – together with funding homes, funds and household workplaces – with a technological infrastructure that enables them to handle and distribute investments in actual estate-backed loans within the US, whereas saving time and prices.
“We allow each events – builders who want fast financing, and traders who’re searching for a stable choice – to fulfill in a sensible means,” explains Shahar. A stable choice, he provides, is an funding that’s thought-about comparatively secure – with low danger and secure returns. “Our know-how analyzes all transactions in actual time – asset valuation, danger identification, due diligence – in a a lot deeper and extra environment friendly means than is at present widespread with non-public lenders.”
Outdated market, new platform
The short-term mortgage marketplace for actual property builders within the US has been dominated for years by small non-public lenders, which frequently function in a standard, human-based method, with a lot of varieties, handbook processes and gradual response occasions. “Anybody who begins a fund of $100 or $200 million shortly discovers that it’s tough for them to develop past that,” explains Shahar. “As such a fund grows, it may possibly not deal with a lot of small loans – it merely doesn’t pay for itself operationally. That’s the reason they abandon this subject, and that’s precisely the place we are available in.”
Key gamers at present energetic within the subject embrace non-public lenders corresponding to Hirshmark and S3 Capital, which deal with offering financing to actual property builders, typically in quantities of tens of hundreds of thousands of {dollars}. Alongside these, there are additionally corporations corresponding to Sharestates, which provides asset-backed loans in a crowdfunding mannequin, and Upright, which primarily appeals to certified traders.
Based on Atlas, most gamers out there nonetheless depend on conventional working fashions, with handbook overview processes and decentralized danger administration. As well as, Atlas Make investments’s nice benefit, in line with Shahar, lies in the truth that the system they developed permits them to handle a lot of small transactions effectively and shortly – or within the phrases of the know-how world, “work at scale” – to carry out many operations with out dropping management or rising the price of the method. He additionally stresses the deal with the quantity of loans, with the corporate concentrating – in contrast to its rivals – on loans of as much as $20 million.
The corporate has a B2B enterprise mannequin, which addresses solely institutional entities. All loans offered by means of the platform are for actual property initiatives within the US. “The principle purpose for that is the supply of information,” explains Shahar. “Within the US, there’s excessive accessibility to information – each on belongings and debtors – and this enables us to carry out an in-depth evaluation of every transaction. In Europe and Israel, this data merely doesn’t exist on the similar decision, so we’re at present centered on the US market. Sooner or later, we might develop, however not within the foreseeable future.”
Raised $13 million
Since its inception, the corporate has raised $13 million in three financing rounds, the latest of which was when it raised $8.5 million in November 2024. Among the many traders are the enterprise capital funds State of Thoughts Ventures and The Storage Fund (which led the final spherical), together with non-public traders corresponding to Man Gamzu, Boaz Schwartz, Jonathan Kolber and Roy Oron. Together with them are additionally the Anfield household funding workplace and holding firm SaxeCap.
Shahar says that Atlas is at present on the verge of closing a major take care of a big institutional physique – a deal, which is valued at double the whole quantity of capital raised up to now. “This deal will permit us to succeed in profitability within the brief time period,” he says.
Shahar stresses that Atlas’ strategy differs from that of different startups available on the market. “I do not imagine in operating after funding with no actual marketing strategy.” He says, “We’re shifting ahead responsibly – with precise income, energetic prospects and progress primarily based on a transparent want.” Within the context of current market turmoil and Trump’s tariff coverage, Shahar notes that uncertainty truly performs to their benefit. “In occasions of volatility, traders have a tendency to hunt stability,” he says, “and actual estate-backed loans are seen as a safer and extra engaging answer.”
The Tech-IL Convention will happen on Wednesday, April 23 at Startup Nation Central in Tel Aviv, when the “Globes” rankings of the ten most promising startups in 2025 will probably be revealed. The listing is being compiled for the nineteenth 12 months by the votes of 80 enterprise capital tech traders energetic in Israel
Revealed by Globes, Israel enterprise information – en.globes.co.il – on April 21, 2025.
© Copyright of Globes Writer Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2025.
