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Small business news releases. Delightree raises $25M to build the agentic Operating System for franchise and multi-unit brands. New funding will accelerate Delightree's mission to bring agentic AI to the operators, franchisees, and frontline teams who power Main Street SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 4, 2026 /PRNewswire/ - Delightree, the AI operating system for franchise and multi-unit brands, today announced $25 million in funding from Innovius, Accel, Timber Grove Ventures, and Emergent. The funding will accelerate Delightree's expansion across restaurants, fitness, wellness, retail, healthcare, and home services, industries that employ more than 50 million Americans yet have not benefited from recent advances in AI. Demand has accelerated since Delightree launched its AI-powered operating system just over two years ago. Revenue has grown nearly 20x, and the platform is now used across more than 6,000 locations nationwide. Customers including [solidcore], Dunn Brothers Coffee, JETSET, Five Star Franchising, MOOYAH Burgers, and Beem Light Sauna use Delightree to streamline training, compliance, communications, audits, and new location openings across distributed operations. Delightree has added customers spanning fitness, food and beverage, franchising, retail, and other multi-location industries. "Most software built for multi-unit businesses was designed to track operations, not run them," said Tushar Mishra, CEO and co-founder of Delightree. "Operators don't need another dashboard. They need a system that helps every location execute consistently, from training and compliance to daily operations and performance. Enterprise chains have long had access to sophisticated operational infrastructure. We believe every operator on Main Street should have access to those same capabilities." The AI Operating System for the Physical Economy Multi-unit businesses operate with fragmented systems for training, compliance, communications, audits, and task management. Today Delightree replaced those disconnected tools with a single operations layer, and tomorrow they will put AI in charge of running it. Instead of an operator combing through dashboards to find what's broken, AI will work as a 24/7 ops manager: it will surface issues as they happen, track remediation to close, and assign owners without being asked. Teams won't need to chase information; they'll just start acting on it. A frontline employee can ask, "How do I comp a customer?" instead of searching through manuals. A franchisee can compare labor costs or operational performance against the rest of the system in real time, without waiting on corporate reports. A franchisor can see exactly where launches are delayed, where standards are slipping, and what actions need attention next. Delightree acts as a companion for frontline employees, a coach for franchisees, and an operating team for franchisors. Across the customer base, businesses on Delightree open new locations two to three months faster, a reduction of 25 percent or more for a typical operator, while frontline teams reclaim up to 30 percent of their time and have less turnover through automation and centralized execution. JETSET Pilates partnered with Delightree to automate studio launches and onboarding workflows as JETSET expanded nationwide. Slick City leverages Delightree to centralize safety inspections, audits, and compliance workflows across locations. Five Star Franchising used Delightree to consolidate manuals, communications, training, and operational visibility across its franchise portfolio. "The most powerful thing AI can do for the American economy isn't eliminate a job. It's to create an owner," said Madhulika Mukherjee, co-founder of Delightree. "For decades, operational advantages at scale have been concentrated among the largest chains. We believe AI can make those capabilities accessible to every franchisee, operator, and growing brand." New Investment Supports Next Phase of Growth With the new funding, Delightree plans to expand its engineering and product teams, accelerate development of its AI operating system, and continue building capabilities that help franchise and multi-unit brands automate operations at scale. The company sees a significant opportunity to bring operational intelligence and execution support to industries that have historically lacked access to the technology infrastructure available to large enterprises. Future investments will focus on helping operators reduce management overhead, launch new locations faster, improve consistency across distributed teams, and give frontline employees instant access to the information they need to do their jobs. "Scaling a distributed business has historically required adding layers of management and operational overhead," said Xiaolei Cong, Partner at Innovius. "Delightree is building a much more scalable operating model for how these businesses train teams, maintain standards, and coordinate execution across locations." "Backing 7 Brew Coffee, Insomnia Cookies, and Sweetgreen early showed us what separates local brands from national ones: technology once reserved for the largest chains," said Daniel Fleischmann, Partner at Timber Grove Ventures. "Delightree is giving operators access to capabilities that can accelerate expansion, improve execution, and help build the next generation of category-defining brands." About Delightree Delightree is the AI-powered operating system for multi-unit businesses. The platform helps operators manage training, compliance, audits, communications, and new-location launches across distributed teams from a single system. Built originally for franchises and now expanding across the broader physical economy, Delightree helps businesses scale operations faster while improving consistency, visibility, and frontline execution. SOURCE Delightree

Pilates studio to open new location in Friendswood. Published July 6, 2026 at 11:50 a.m. CT JETSET Pilates, a reformer studio specializing in group pilates classes, is coming to Friendswood, according to the company's website. While an official opening date has not yet been announced, construction is underway and will be completed in October, according to a filing with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, or TDLR. JETSET specializes in providing full-service studios for all levels and intensities of pilates workouts, including fundamental classes, full-body reformer, upper and lower body, and core-focused workouts. A variety of intro offers, monthly memberships and class packages are available on the studio's website. Pricing varies by location. * Opening TBD * 106 Whispering Pines Ave., Ste. 107, Friendswood * www.jetsetpilates.com