Ed Stevenson, investment manger at SFC Capital looks at why investment and growth into the augmented reality sector will accelerate over the next decade.

After a stuttering start - which could in fact be traced all the way back to the development by cinematographer Morton Heilig in the mid-1950s of the Sensorama, an arcade-style theatre cabinet that used stereo speakers, a stereoscopic 3D display, fans, smell generators, and a vibrating chair to stimulate all the senses - augmented reality (AR) seems set finally to break through into the mainstream. The global market is projected to reach $149 billion by 2025, up from just $4.32 billion in 2017.

Two advertising executives who quit their jobs to develop their own 3D software have secured over £450,000 in investment to help them launch their product.

Ben Cyzer and Tim Phillips created visual effects for TV commercials for brands such as Sony, Nike and Samsung and were behind the penguin in the John Lewis adverts. They set up London-based Artificial Artists in 2018 to find a way to make quality 3D animation more suited to the faster pace and lower budgets of digital media.

New figures highlight the resilience of the software sector throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, with a rise in capital raises during the lockdown period says GCA Altium report.

A businesswoman whose software platform helps companies to manage rebate and incentive schemes has raised a further £950,000 from investors.

Leanne Bonner-Cooke MBE, who founded the e-Bate platform, secured the money from the MEIF Proof of Concept & Early Stage Fund, which is managed by Mercia and part of the Midlands Engine Investment Fund (MEIF), Mercia's own EIS funds and the government's Future Fund.With the pandemic having boosted demand for the e-Bate platform, the funding will allow the Leicester-based firm to create five new jobs and further increase global sales. This latest funding round is the second investment by MEIF and brings the total raised so far by the company to over £2m.

Edgify, a company building AI training frameworks at the edge, has secured a $6.5m seed funding round backed by Octopus Ventures, Mangrove Capital Partners and a semiconductor giant.

Edgify’s technology enables any connected device - known as ‘edge devices’ - to interpret vast amounts of data generated at the edge, train a complete AI model locally, and proceed to share that learning across an entire network of similar devices, thereby training them all to identify unique aspects of a given object for use of computer vision, NLP, voice recognition and any other form of AI. 

Condense Reality, a virtual reality startup developing technology to transform how viewers watch live entertainment and sports, has raised a seed round of more than £800,000, including £220,000 from SFC Capital, the most active seed-stage investor in the UK. The remaining funds come from two grant awards, together worth almost £500,000, as well as smaller commitments from RLC Ventures and angel investors. The investment will see Condense Reality increase its R&D capabilities and commercialise its technology over the next 12 months.

Traveltek, an innovative Scottish software business that provides a comprehensive booking platform for the leisure travel sector, plans to launch a suite of data technology products designed to help travel agents and tour operators to gain vital insight into which parts of the sector are seeing the fastest and most sustained recovery in order to better plan their businesses going forward.

Rockley Photonics, a leading integrated optics solutions provider, has closed an additional $50m of growth funding from leading deep-tech VCs, strategic investors, and institutional funds including Credit Suisse backed SIG-i Capital and Applied Ventures, LLC, the venture capital arm of Applied Materials, Inc., as well as existing shareholders. To date, Rockley has raised over $225m of financing to develop its unique silicon photonics platform.

Foresight Group and Elgin Energy have formed a joint venture to develop a pipeline of greenfield solar projects across the UK. The JV aims to develop six projects located in England, Wales and Scotland, with a total generating capacity of 200MW.

A major investment in Lightning Fibre, a community-oriented full fibre network provider, will see hyper-fast fibre broadband rolled out in East Sussex with Eastbourne and Hastings the first towns to receive the cutting-edge technology.

The announcement follows the completion of a long term finance agreement between Lightning Fibre by the Foresight Group, a leading infrastructure and private equity investment manager.

Nu Quantum, the quantum photonics company, has raised £2.1 million in Seed funding in a round led by Amadeus Capital Partners. Ahren Innovation Capital, IQ Capital, Cambridge Enterprise and Martlet Capital have also followed-on from the company's pre-Seed investment round last September, with Seraphim Capital joining as a new investor. The funding will go towards a state-of-the-art photonics lab in Cambridge and a major recruitment drive for scientists, product team members and business functions as the company approaches the launch of its first commercial technology demonstration.

A £10 million funding package from the UK Government’s Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF) will help to scale the insect bioconversion sector, accelerating the transition to sustainable methods of farming.

As part of the project consortium, Better Origin will use the funding to focus on scaling their insect processing and value extraction technology to convert insects into products such as animal feed and human food. A result of years of research and development, their patented ‘Metamorphosis Technology’, which processes insects into different products, represents the most cost-effective,tailored processing line developed to date.