Foresight Group, a leading independent private equity and infrastructure investment manager, has appointed Matt McLoughlin to join the Private Equity Team. Based in Cambridge, Matt will support the deployment and management of the recently launched Foresight East of England Fund.

Private equity house WestBridge has further expanded its team with the appointment of Rebecca Sinclair as Investment Executive.

Bolt, the leading European on-demand transportation platform, has launched a dedicated environmental impact fund with seed capital of €10 million aimed at initiatives which deliver global social and environmental benefits.

US and Israel-based cybersecurity company Sepio Systems, has raised a $6.5 million in Series A funding round led by Hanaco Ventures and Merlin Ventures, with the participation of existing investors Energias de Portugal (EDP), Mindset Ventures and Pico Partners. Since its establishment Sepio Systems has raised $11 million.

Swiss startup Optune has successfully closed the first close of its seed rounds with Bexio founder Stefan Brunner and a UK family office, as well as with existing investors. Optune's B2B booking platform is already being used by more than 600 active artists in Switzerland. Now, the Swiss tech startup wants to establish itself Europe-wide.

Immersive Labs, the world’s first fully interactive, on-demand and gamified cyber skills platform, has closed $40 million in funding led by global growth equity investor Summit Partners, with participation from existing investor Goldman Sachs. The investment will be used to support expansion initiatives in North America, where customer demand highlights a clear need to optimize cyber skills and guard against constantly evolving threats. The company believes this new round of funding illustrates how this dynamic technology is ushering in a new era of active training that enables professionals to acquire additional skills in richly immersive environments at their own pace and on their own schedules. 

Birmingham-based Linear Diagnostics Limited (LDL) has secured £2m of investment from MEIF and other investors to develop new platform technology for medical diagnostic testing.

PRIVATE equity house WestBridge has further expanded its team with the appointment of Rebecca Sinclair as Investment Executive.

BGF, the UK and Ireland’s most active investor in growing businesses, has exited its investment in Thames Technology, one of the UK’s largest manufacturers and designers of payment, loyalty and gift cards. The business has been acquired by Paragon ID, the Paris-listed provider of identification and traceability solutions.

Israeli precision agriculture startup Agritask, which has been operating in bootstrap mode till recently, has completed an $8.5M Series A financing round, led by the InsuResilience Investment Fund and co-invested by Barn Investimentos. The InsuResilience Investment Fund was set up on behalf of the German government by KfW and is managed by Swiss-based impact investment manager BlueOrchard Finance. Barn Investimentos is a Brazilian early stage VC Investor focusing on high growth companies in ag-tech and in other industries.

Mafic, an innovative information company based at the Surrey Technology Centre near Guildford, has won a grant from the national SPRINT (SPace Research and Innovation Network for Technology) programme. Mafic will work with SPRINT partner, the University of Southampton on a major project to develop new machine learning solutions for heavy industries such as shipbuilding, rail, and oil and gas construction.

Medopad, a fast-growing healthtech AI startup headquartered in London, has earned investment in a funding round led by Leaps by Bayer in to further develop its digital health platform. The investment brings Medopad’s total amount raised to over $50M. The company will use the new funds to fuel clinical studies, including digital biomarker discovery, creation of digital therapeutics (DTx), technology development, geographic expansion and commercial growth through strategic collaborations.