On International Women’s Day, female representatives of Mercia’s investment team argue that whilst there are shortcomings in the VC industry, some progress is being made but insist that mandating female-led investment levels is not necessary.

Specialist property peer-to-peer lender CrowdProperty has launched CrowdProperty AutoInvest, the newest and easiest way to invest on the CrowdProperty platform.

CrowdProperty AutoInvest is a stress-free way to invest money across every high-quality, first charge secured project launched, built to save investors time and effort in building a diversified investment portfolio without platform or financial advisor fees. AutoInvest is available to lenders in both their Standard and ISA accounts.

Revolutionary heating specialist Koleda has overfunded it's latest funding round on Kickstarter which is more than 700% funded.

The funding round is centered around their new SOLUS radiator, the most efficient home heating device ever made. The SOLUS can cut heating bills by up to 80% due to its innovative use of graphene.

Growth in the UK private sector remained stagnant in the three months to February as momentum in early 2019 remained subdued, the latest Confederation of British Industry Growth Indicator showed on Sunday. Looking ahead, further decline is anticipated with private sector activity expected to fall slightly, in the quarter to May, with a negative balance of 4%.

Two trade associations, who work at policy level to help small businesses secure growth funding, and a private investment house specialising in alternative investment for SMEs, discuss the reasons behind the slowdown and the support needed for small businesses to prop up the private sector.

New research from Revolution.Aero, the global meeting place for people who are reshaping, rethinking and revolutionising business and personal aviation, 

London-based veterinary tech business, Felcana, has received an early stage venture capital investment from Global Venture Partners and Seedrs. The terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Founded in 2016 by veterinary professionals, Felcana combines artificial intelligence, data analytics and veterinary expertise to help predict, simplify and treat over 90% of health issues for dogs and cats. Felcana will use the fresh capital to expand its presence in the UK and to scale internationally.

Belfast-based ECG biometrics innovator B-Secur has closed a follow-on funding round worth £4 million, from investors, including Accelerated Digital Ventures(ADV) and Kernel Capital.

Beauhurst has outlined the UK’s Life Sciences landscape and provided a downloadable spreadsheet of the top companies in the sector – by amount of funding received, percentage growth in turnover and latest valuation. 

Harwell Campus, the UK’s science and innovation hub, has secured £110 million funding from Santander Corporate & Commercial to further expand the Campus, and enter its next 400,000 sq ft phase of development.  Santander has assisted with growth that will exceed 1 million sq ft in under eight years. With a total of 5.5 million sq ft planned develpment, Harwell Campus is rapidly becoming the fastest growing UK location dedicated to the science and technology sector.

Swipii, the loyalty card app, has secured investment of £1.9m via a funding round led by award-winning Scottish venture capital firm Par Equity.

The latest version of the app removes the need for physical loyalty cards by linking to a debit or credit card and rewarding users with points as they shop at businesses signed-up to Swipii. The app’s original iteration had 1.1m users and its 1,700 affiliated businesses saw up to a 1.5x revenue boost, but it relied on using iPads to track visits only.

Since opening offices in Newcastle and Durham in May 2017, Maven Capital Partners has invested a total of £10 million in dynamic, high growth businesses in the North East region, driving economic prosperity and safeguarding over 400 jobs.

This significant level of investment has mainly been achieved through Maven’s management of regional funds in the North East, the £20m Finance Durham Fund established by Durham County Council and the £27 million North East Development Capital Fund, supported by the European Regional Development Fund. To date, Maven has identified and completed investments to support the growth strategies of 14 dynamic local businesses, including the largest independent engineering business in County Durham, Dyer Engineering, shipping container operator and leading self-storage provider, Parsons Containers and reverse-auction marketplace for insurance products, honcho.

London Co-investment Fund's Flavia Richardson comments on why we need to change the landscape for female entrepreneurs.

This week we are celebrating the International Women’s Day, a reminder of the continuous struggle for equality of opportunity. A few major research projects conducted by Atomico VC, Diversity VC, and British Business Bank, have corroborated the narrative felt by many women while fundraising.

While the outcome highlighted hard truths for the investment sector and the innovation economy, it has also provided us with the key to a brighter and more inclusive tomorrow, if we change our approaches.