Oxford Endovascular, a pioneering British MedTech company and spin-out from Oxford University, is developing a treatment for brain aneurysms, that will overcome challenges with existing medical devices. It has just raised $10m in a series A funding round.

The funding which was conducted in Pounds Sterling includes a £3m investment from new investors Vulpes Investment Management, who joined to lead the round and funds from the Additio Investment Group. Existing investors Oxford Sciences Innovation PLC, Parkwalk Advisors, Perivoli Innovations, Oxford Investment Consultants, the University of Oxford and private individuals also followed on.

The Association of Investment Companies (AIC) has published the amount of money raised by VCTs for the 2020/21 tax year. During the pandemic and at a time when the UK’s young companies have needed it most, the VCT sector has raised £685 million for investment in small, innovative UK businesses.

Forward Partners and Landscape VC have revealed that the majority of founders believe their investors failed to add value beyond capital, despite most firms promising a package of support.

Halal Angels Network is among the first to penetrate the $5 trillion Halal consumer market and has teamed up FasterCapital to support Technology Startups in the field of AI, Blockchain, Robotics, IoT, Fintech.

Scottish bio-tech company, BioCaptiva, has developed a novel next generation “liquid biopsy” technology device that could revolutionise the early diagnosis and monitoring of difficult to detect cancers.  The University of Edinburgh spin-out has raised over £1m in seed funding from Edinburgh-based business angel investment syndicate, Archangels, and Scottish Enterprise, to help develop the technology.  To prepare the company for this next stage in its development, BioCaptiva has appointed Dr Frank Armstrong FRCPE as non-executive chairman and Dr Stephen Little as a non-executive director.

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.

Circularity Capital LLP has continued to build its portfolio of European growth stage businesses enabling the circular economy by leading a growth capital investment in PackBenefit, a European innovator in high-performance fibre-based food packaging. The investment sees AXA IM Alts co-invest alongside Circularity Capital through the AXA Impact Fund Climate and Biodiversity. Through this investment, Circularity Capital and AXA IM team up with JZ International, who invested in the company at inception in 2013.  

118 Equity Crowdfunding campaigns successfully closed in Q1 2021, the second-highest number of campaigns recorded in any given quarter. £75m was raised in the quarter via Equity Crowdfunding, a 25% increase compared to the amount raised in the first quarter of 2020.  Over 64,000 individual investments were made in crowdfunding in the quarter, with more than 75% of the campaigns attracting 250+ backers.

Innovate Finance, the industry body representing UK FinTech, has announced that Charlotte Crosswell will step down from her position as Chief Executive Officer in May 2021. 

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.

Developing nations are missing out on a wave of investor interest in climate change and sustainability. To get in the game, these countries will require a significant overhaul of their debt capital markets.  This is the conclusion of a report released by the Centre for Climate Finance & Investment at Imperial College Business School.