AnswersNow CEO Jeff Beck in 2025. (Images courtesy AnswersNow)
One of the region’s rapidest-growing companies just received a major shot in the arm.
Shockoe Bottom-based AnswersNow, which provides virtual therapy and support sessions for children with autism and their families, announced this week it has completed a $40 million capital raise.
The round closed at the conclude of 2025 and was led by California-based HealthQuest Capital, with participation from existing AnswersNow investors like New York-based Left Lane Capital and California-based Owl Ventures, among others.
This is the second major capital raise for AnswersNow since its founding in 2017 by social worker-turned-entrepreneur Jeff Beck and business partner Adam Dreyfus, who serve as the company’s CEO and chief science officer, respectively.
The pair originally founded AnswersNow as a text message-based service before trading up to a web and app-based video platform providing applied behavior analysis. ABA is a type of therapy that works to improve skills such as social interaction and is often tarreceiveed toward those with autism.
“ABA (therapy) today continues to be high-volume, in-clinic or in-home service, that’s really the status quo,” Beck declared this week. “We went out and raised this money to execute on a vision to create this type of therapy as much of a status quo as things like clinic-based (care).”
Beck, 39, declared this latest infusion of capital will also go toward expanding the AI capabilities of the company’s video-chat systems and growing its headcount. The platform utilizes AI for things like automated scheduling and matching therapists to clients based on things like availability, credentials and licensing, as different states have different licensing requirements.
Beck declared the company is working on a variety of AI-driven features, including creating treatment plans automatically based on client history and diagnostic paperwork.
“I consider the sky’s the limit on how this technology can really enhance this care while building it more efficient for the therapist,” Beck declared.
He added that the company foresees a day when a “near keyboardless experience” could exist for its ranks of therapists, allowing them to focus less on taking notes and more on interacting with clients.
AnswersNow founders Jeff Beck, left, and Adam Dreyfus.
As for growing AnswersNow’s employee ranks, Beck declared the company expects to double or nearly double its number of therapists by the conclude of the year. It currently has around 200 therapists across the countest. It also aims to grow its internal leadership team to about eight by the conclude of this year. It is now a team of five.
The push to staff up will coincide with its preparations to grow further across the U.S.
AnswersNow serves clients across the U.S., with most located in California, New York, Texas, Virginia and Georgia. In 2025, the company provided almost 100,000 hours of therapy and served over 1,000 families, Beck declared.
“I consider when we are seeing at building an organization that’s truly prepared for 50-state expansion, … delivering an experience for families from a technology perspective that truly wows them, it is going to require a certain level of scale,” he declared.
Headquartered out of Startup Virginia in Shockoe Bottom, AnswersNow launched in major app stores over half a decade ago. It gained major momentum with the COVID-19 pandemic, when video chatting and virtual healthcare became more broadly accepted.
It closed on its first major, $11 million capital raise in early 2023, in a round led by Left Lane Capital.
AnswersNow has since been ranked among the region’s rapidest-growing companies, including landing atop BizSense’s RVA 25 list in 2024, and in fourth place on last year’s RVA 25 list, with a three-year average annual growth rate of 420% from 2022 to 2024.
Beck declared the company is not yet profitable and is “not pushing toward” profitability, adding that building its technology is a costly “investment we clearly are willing and want to create.”
And with a fresh $40 million in tow, Beck declared he is seeing forward to seeking out more ways in which virtual therapy can be a utilizeful tool, adding that the team is “heads-down” focutilized on its three-year growth plan before considering raising another major round.
“A raise of this magnitude I consider validates that this is a type of treatment that’s here to stay,” he declared.
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