Traverse City-based artificial intelligence firm FirstIgnite Inc. has been acquired by a Chicago-based investor.
Merit Holdings, which buys and manages software companies, acquired FirstIgnite after first completing a 2025 deal for Inteum Co. LLC, a Kirkland, Wash.-based provider of intellectual property management software.
FirstIgnite and Inteum have worked together in the past and now have common ownership.
The latest deal “brings together Inteum’s decades-long leadership in IP management with FirstIgnite’s modern Ai-drive approach to commercialization, outreach, and relationship building,” FirstIgnite CEO Chase Bonhag said in a statement on the transaction.
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Founded in 2019, FirstIgnite developed artificial intelligence-based software for universities and expanded into offering a platform for career services, tech transfer, advancement, corporate relations and research development.
“Together, we’re creating a more complete solution that helps universities manage, promote and commercialize their research more effectively while staying focused on the people and partnerships that make innovation possible,” Bonhag said. “We’re energized by what (the deal) means for our customers, partners, and teams. We’re just getting started on the value we intend to bring to the market.”
Terms of the deal were undisclosed.
For a 2025 Crain’s story on fast-growth tech startups in the state, Bonhag said FirstIgnite was “one of the fastest growing startups in the state of Michigan and maybe even in the entire Midwest.”
“I believe us to be the industry leader in artificial intelligence and higher education,” Bonhag said at the time. “FirstIgnite builds and ships artificial intelligence software faster than anybody who’s not located in San Francisco, and I’m confident of that.”
FirstIgnite and Inteum “have already proven the value of working together,” said Merit Holdings CEO John Burke. Through Merit’s ownership, the two companies “can now collaborate more deeply and invest with a long-term mindset, aligning their efforts to help technology transfer teams operate more efficiently and achieve better commercialization outcomes,” Burke said.
FirstIgnite was a portfolio company of the Michigan State University Research Foundation’s Michigan Rise and Red Cedar Ventures investment funds that invest in startups based in the state. The company also participated in the foundation’s Conquer Accelerator program in 2020 based out of Grand Rapids.
FirstIgnite also was a 2021 graduate of Y Combinator, a San Francisco-based technology startup accelerator that includes alumni such as Airbnb, DoorDash, Dropbox, Instacart, Reddit and Stripe.
In a social media post on LinkedIn, Red Cedar Venture Executive Director Jeff Wesley wrote that the company’s sale reflects “the long-term value of early-stage investment and sustained founder support.”
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