The diversity of investor types in the UK contributes to the success of the nation's high-growth scene, as different companies have varying requirements from their backers. In Part 1 of a new blog series, Beauhurst has compiled a rundown of the most active types of investors in the UK and how they function, from venture capital to crowdfunding and angel networks. 

The amount of equity invested in smaller UK businesses rose 5% to £6.7bn in 2018, the highest amount recorded, reveals British Business Bank’s annual Small Business Equity Tracker report.

Ocado has announced a £17 million investment into the vertical farming industry, including an investment into Jones Food, Europe’s largest vertical farm. The investment into Jones Food, represents one of the largest investments into a UK agritech company so far this year. Law firm, Ashfords, advised Guinness Asset Management, the majority shareholder of Jones Food, in the transaction.

AI data extraction start-up SuccessData, formerly known as sc.io, has closed a £600k investment round led by B2B startup investor SuperSeed. This investment will allow the start-up to finance the hiring of data scientists and machine learning experts that can drive strategy and the growth of the business. This announcement follows the company relaunching its global brand to reflect its ambitious international growth plans for the European and US markets.

Tonkotsu, the Emma Reynolds and Ken Yamada-founded ramen restaurant group plans expansion after partnering with investment firm YFM Equity Partners.  The group, which is led by Managing Director, Stephen Evans, operates nine restaurants in London and one in Selfridges Birmingham, with two more due to open later this year in Peckham and Shoreditch.

Reynolds and Yamada continue to be involved in the business, and Yamada says: “This partnership will allow us to grow our business, enabling us to open a handful more Tonkotsus. Our commitment to the quality of our food, our homemade noodles and the way we treat our people, who are the heart of this business, has been fundamental from day one. We chose YFM as our partner as we felt they shared our ambition to grow the business in the right way to maintain the culture and the brand”

Downing Ventures, part of London-based investment manager Downing LLP, has appointed James Nettleton as Principal of its 12-strong venture capital team.

Kernel Capital and Par Equity have led a £1.2M investment in Datactics Limited, a Belfast-based provider of RegTech solutions for the banking and financial services sector.  This is the second round of funding secured by the company from The Bank of Ireland Kernel Capital Growth Fund (NI).  Datactics provides data quality and matching software to the financial services industry and government departments to help financial firms measure, clean and match data ahead of a regulatory reporting, business intelligence or analytics process. 

The London-based Venture Firm, Hambro Perks, has appointed Andrew Noyons as Managing Director.

European Buy & Build activity reached its highest recorded level in 2018 with a total disclosed deal value of £9.5 billion, according to Silverfleet Capital’s European Buy & Build Monitor. Despite increased Brexit uncertainty, the UK & Ireland remained steadfast as the most active region for add-ons.

To coincide with London Tech Week, global investment platform Funderbeam and Sensor City are co-hosting “The Liverpool Landscape” on Thursday 13th June at Sensor City from 5.30pm. This is the first in a series of events taking place across tech hubs in the North, including Manchester and Leeds which will be taking place later this summer.

Immedis, a specialist provider of enterprise technology solutions for global payroll and mobility tax services to multinationals, has today announced that it has secured €25 million in  strategic investment from Scottish Equity Partners (SEP), a top-performing venture capital and growth equity firm backed by blue chip international investors including the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund.  Payroll technology solution, iConnect, which has revolutionised the global payroll market due to its use of robotic process automation, AI and powerful data visualisation. Clients have grown to include Uber, Wayfair, First Derivatives, NYIT, and DCC.

BGF, the UK and Ireland’s most active investor in growing companies, has bolstered its Quoted team with the appointment of Simon Blackaby as an investor.

Simon joins from the EMEA Equity Capital Markets team at Jefferies International and will be working with Tom Jenkins, Matt Singh and Paul Stevens in BGF’s Quoted team, specialising in funding options for AIM-listed businesses.