For the second year running, I eschewed the annual en primeurs tastings in Bordeaux this vintage. 

Nivo, the Manchester-based instant messaging and identity verification platform, has announced the close of a £2m funding round from GP Bullhound, the Angel CoFund and a syndicate of angel investors. This funding will be used to accelerate growth and product innovation, cementing Nivo’s position as the fastest, safest way for financial services companies to sign up and service their customers.

The London based venture firm, Hambro Perks, have recently launched a Co-Investment Fund that is EIS eligible. 

23 per cent of London’s tech companies have experienced investors deferring investment decisions as a direct result of Brexit, according to new research released today by Tech London Advocates.

The private sector, independent network of 7,000 tech leaders, experts and investors, has released the findings of a new study into the impact of Brexit on London tech. The results show that access to capital and talent have both become more challenging in the past two years. 

Established North West capital finance advisory firm Acceleris Capital has announced a return to Greater Manchester as part of a formal spin-out from Seneca Partners Limited. The spin-out is on the back of increasing demand from regional SMEs for capital advisory services, fundraising support and post-transaction assistance.

Synthesia, a UK based startup developing video synthesis technology, has raised $3.1 million to continue their mission of helping brands and content creators scale their video production using AI. This financing was led by LDV Capital, early investor Mark Cuban, and joined by new investors  MMC Ventures, Seedcamp, Martin Varsavsky’s VAS Ventures, TransferWise co-founder Taavet Hinrikus, Tiny VC, and advertising executive Nigel Morris.

Sure Ventures has made a direct investment of £500,000 in VividQ Limited, a UK-based deep tech software company pioneering the application of holography in AR/VR and consumer electronics display.

London-based Venture Firm, Hambro Perks, has appointed ex-Morgan Stanley’s Svenja Grundmann as Investment Associate.

The Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund (NPIF), delivered by British Business Bank, has invested a total of £20m in ambitious, high-growth SMEs in the Leeds City Region.  Since its launch in February 2017, NPIF has delivered equity finance, debt finance, and microfinance solutions, ranging in size from £25,000 to £2m to businesses across the 10 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP) that make up the ‘Northern Powerhouse’ region.  To date, NPIF has completed 104 investments in Leeds City Region-based SMEs across a range of sectors including ICT and manufacturing, which received £5.50m and £5.17m respectively.

Workbooks, a British cloud-based Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and marketing automation vendor, today announces the arrival of Alex Bradley as head of Sales. Following strong company growth, Alex Bradley is the tenth person to join Workbooks in the past six months. These appointments reflect the company’s aim to build a world class organisation focussed on delivering cloud-based business applications to the mid-market that enable operations to be streamlined, insightful decisions to be made and productivity increased.

MUSO, the global authority on digital piracy data, has raised £3.5m in an extension to its £2.5m 2017 Series A with Harwell Capital. The investment will be used to expand the company's sales and marketing and increase its foothold in the digital media, gaming and live broadcast sectors.

Ongoing uncertainty makes it increasingly difficult to predict what the UK business ecosystem will look like or which cities will thrive post-Brexit.