Growth capital investor BGF has invested £14 million in Bloom (Bloom Procurement Services), based in the North East and headquartered in Gateshead. Bloom is the UK’s only public sector procurement marketplace offering an end-to-end managed service procurement solution.  Founded in 2011 by Adam Jacobs, the executive chairman, Bloom provides a dynamic and open access marketplace for the provision of professional services to the UK Public Sector. 

An HR software platform which helps companies to manage remote workers has raised a further £1,275,000 to fund its rapid expansion.  StaffCircle has secured a further £1m from Blackfinch Investments, with the additional funding coming from the MEIF Proof of Concept & Early Stage Fund, which is managed by Mercia and part of the Midlands Engine Investment Fund, and private investors.  

Addition Capital, the London-based family investment office, has completed a control investment into Be-A Education Ltd, supported by funding from Shawbrook Bank.  Hertfordshire-based Be-A Education is the operator of the highly successful and fast-growing New Skills Academy and Staff Skills Training businesses with a mission to make learning accessible to consumers and businesses globally.  To date, the award-winning company has sold nearly 1 million courses to consumers in over 30 countries.

A company whose technology can detect subsidence from satellite data has secured £1.5m from NPIF – Mercia Equity Finance, which is managed by Mercia and part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund, and the Government’s Future Fund.  The latest funding round comes as Leeds-based SatSense is about to launch its new online platform which will be the first to give engineers and other professionals instant access to up-to-date information on ground movements at sites throughout the UK and beyond.

JPIN Venture Catalysts Ltd, India’s No. 1 co-investor network has partnered with an industry leading cohort of investment leaders as part of a $13m raise for Chingari,a global frontrunner in mobile entertainment. The social media start-up serves as India’s homegrown short-form video app; progressing onwards from the raise, the company is set to scale as a steady disruptor to its Chinese equivalent TikTok.

The UK’s first online marketplace for building supplies is relocating to Wales having completed a seed funding round with £500,000 secured from the Development Bank of Wales and BSKG Holdings.

Cyclr Systems Limited has secured over £2 million in new investment led by Blackfinch Ventures and supported by existing investors Juno Capital.

Mid-market private equity firm NorthEdge has acquired Correla, an innovative technology and data services business that aims to help create a less complex and more sustainable energy sector.

Chris Wiles, Senior Investment Manager, Foresight, discusses the importance of Environmental, Social and Governance (“ESG”) benefits in the context of deep tech investing.

CyTAL – a specialist provider of cyber-security product assurance services – has closed a significant equity funding round to support its accelerated growth plans for ProtoCrawler, its ground-breaking cyber security fuzz-testing software.

Silverfleet Capital, the European private equity firm, has invested in the fast-growing, SaaS provider, OneStock, a European leader in modern and agile OMS software for retail.  Silverfleet will hold a significant minority stake in OneStock. 

Par Equity has led a £5 million in Cyan to accelerate Cyan’s ambitious global growth plans as the Company works to help law enforcement, social media and cloud companies find and block harmful content from paedophiles and terrorists.  Other investors in the round included Mercia Asset Management, TriplePoint Capital, SIS Ventures, and Scottish Enterprise.