Astarte Capital Partners LLP, an alternatives co-investment platform, has appointed Omar Habboush, CFA, to its business development team as an Associate. 

Six-in-ten (61%) financial advisers believe there has been insufficient industry focus on decumulation solutions despite an overwhelming majority (86%) expecting exponential growth in the number of clients requiring advice on this area over the next five years.

A new summit connecting emerging technology fund managers with investors has been launched in London by early stage VC firms, 7Percent Ventures and Luminous Ventures.

PredictImmune, developers of pioneering prognostic tools for guiding treatment options and improving patient outcomes in immune-mediated diseases, has announced the completion of its Series B funding having raised £10M.

Catley Lakeman Securities (CLS), the market-leading provider of defined-return investments to asset managers, has announced the launch of Verto MTF; the first and only multilateral trading facility (MTF) for structured products. Verto MTF is a fully regulated exchange, specifically developed to enable participants to buy and sell Private Placement Structured Investments (Structured Products) in the UK. 

In his latest article for AngelNews, James Murdoch considers the challenges that Equity Crowdfunding investors face when trying to ascertain what represents a 'good valuation' for prospective investments.

Beauhurst has analysed every publicly-announced equity fundraising in H1 2019 to spot emerging trends and patterns in the market.

Minerva Business Angels, part of the University of Warwick Science Park and one of the most successful business angel networks in the UK, is joining forces with Nottingham Trent University and the University of Nottingham in a partnership aimed at improving access to finance for innovative local companies.  Minerva has chosen to work with Nottingham’s two universities because both have a track record of identifying research and ideas that have commercial potential, and of providing knowledge and advice to firms looking to improve through innovation.

British Business Bank has supported over 89.000 businesses with £6.6bn of finance, an increase of 27% over the year.

The FSE Group, has  announce that Paul Marston has joined their board of directors. Paul is the former Managing Director of NatWest Bank for the South of England & Wales.  

Keensight Capital, one of the leading European Growth Buyout¹ firms, has entered into an exclusive agreement to acquire a majority stake in Smile, the European leader in digital and open source. Subject to the completion of the information and consultation process of the employees representative bodies of the Smile group and the approval of the transaction by the French competition authority, Keensight Capital, which has built a strong partnership with Smile over the years having first invested in the company from 2013 to 2017, would replace Eurazeo PME as majority shareholder. Eurazeo PME would also be reinvesting in the company, alongside the management team and the employees.

Standard Cognition, which is building the next interface of retail, has raised a $35M Series B funding round led by the EQT Ventures fund with participation from existing investors Initialized Capital, CRV and Y Combinator. This brings Standard’s total funding to date to more than $86M, and its post-money valuation to $535M - more than a 2x increase since the company raised its Series A in Nov. 2018.