Suggestv, the intelligent video discovery platform for publishers, has today closed its seed investment round, raising a total of $1m. The investment round, led by Mark Pearson at Fuel Ventures, is being used to bolster the company’s UK business development plans, grow its publisher base and propel the company further into global markets.

A new report from VentureFounders, in conjunction with Beauhurst, has found that 56% of UK tech founders expect that their business will sell for £50m or less, but 80% want to re-enter the tech ecosystem and support it post-exit. 

See report here

Mercia Fund Managers, which manages part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund (NPIF), is celebrating a milestone, having invested over £5m from the fund to support businesses throughout Yorkshire, the Humber and Tees Valley. 

Mojiworks, the leading start-up dedicated to creating games for the world’s fast-growing chat and messaging platforms, has raised £2.1 million in funding led by Balderton Capital, Europe’s largest early stage venture capital investor.

Scottish Equity Partners (SEP) has completed a significant investment in Dotmatics. The company, founded in 2005, is a leading global scientific informatics software provider delivering enterprise solutions tailored to the modern, highly collaborative and mobile scientific environments. 

Ventilation systems specialist Monodraught has received a £2.65m investment from BGF to support its long-term growth plans. The High Wycombe headquartered company will use the funding for product development and expansion into new markets.

Draper Esprit has announced a strategy to target up to £75m ($100m) of investment in the top seed funds across Europe over a five-year period. Draper Esprit has committed to invest in the latest funds of both Seedcamp (www.seedcamp.com) and Episode 1 Ventures (www.episode1.com), widely recognised as two of the UK’s leading seed fund platforms. 

The social enterprise Charity Checkout has successfully raised over $1m to accelerate its growth. This round of investment was led by the founders of Octopus Group, Chris Hulatt and Simon Rogerson, who last week were announced EY Entrepreneur of the Year UK 2017. The investment round also included four existing investors.

BotSkill has secured a £250,000 investment led by the British Robotics Seed Fund (BRSF). The investment is the second in an ongoing series that have been made into UK’s robotics-focussed start-ups by the fund.

Chris Hulatt and Simon Rogerson, Co-Founders of London-based Octopus Group, were named ‘EY Entrepreneur Of The Year UK 2017 overall winner’ at an awards ceremony in London last night.

The winners of the BVCA Responsible Investment Awards 2017 were announced today at the BVCA Summit in London as we celebrated the outstanding Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance practices within the private equity and venture capital community.

SyndicateRoom has supported Warwick Audio in a £2.2m funding round, as part of a larger financing activity bringing in more than £3m to the company. The funds will support Warwick Audio as it prepares to push its patented technology into the automotive market. The round was backed by leading private investment firm, Mercia Technologies.