Green Angel Syndicate has successfully led a £520k investment round into AirEx, the IoT-enabled smart ventilation control solution start-up tackling heat waste in homes.

In the UK alone, tens of millions of homes were built with low energy standards. Homeowners struggle with cold, uncomfortable draughts and high energy bills – and this situation leads to energy waste on a massive scale.

Ventures Director at Blackfinch Ventures, Dr Reuben Wilcock, discusses his top-tips for start-ups seeking investment.

NVM Private Equity has completed the management buy-out of Leicestershire-based Secure Retail Limited (Secure), a leading provider of electronic payment solutions.

British Business Investments, a commercial subsidiary of the British Business Bank, has made a new commitment to Dow Schofield Watts Angels (DSW Angels) as the first partner in its £100m Regional Angels Programme.

A businesswoman has achieved her dream of opening a shop in Cardiff to sell clothes that combine fashion with traditional spiritual values with the help of a loan from the Development Bank of Wales.

Eric Tveter, former Central Europe CEO of Liberty Global, has become a major investor and the first Chairman of London-based start up Veloce Esports.

Tveter’s investment is part of Veloce’s ‘Angel’ funding round, which has now closed with further announcements due shortly. His stake increases the valuation of the multi-million pound company as it now proceeds to Series A funding.

The rapidly growing esports organisation, which officially launched in June 2018, has already claimed a number of successes in its short history as the group has established itself as the number one racing esports viewership network in the world, with a monthly audience of over 35 million.

The Riverside Company, a global private equity firm focused on the smaller end of the middle market, and co-investors have sold RE Panels S.A., parent company of EPCO and TECSEDO, to THI Investments. As the European leader in panels for overhead doors, EPCO makes sandwich panels for residential, commercial and industrial sectional overhead doors. The company completed the add-on of Swiss manufacturer TECSEDO in 2018, cementing RE Panels’ leadership position in the European market.

Home security tech specialist, Boundary, has secured £1.22 million investment from Equity Gap and the Scottish Investment Bank, the investment arm of Scotland’s national economic development agency Scottish Enterprise, to create several new jobs and prepare its innovative smart home security alarm for launch.

Boundary is the invention of Robin Knox and Paul Walton, the entrepreneurs behind IntelligentPOS, which was acquired by iZettle in 2016 and subsequently sold to PayPal for £1.6 billion.

The Insurtech M&A Market Report from international technology mergers and acquisitions advisors, Hampleton Partners, reveals that 2019 global fundraising for insurtech neared $3 billion in 1H 2019* and is on track to reaching $6 billion by the end of the year. Last year, insurtech fundraises increased 27 per cent, with 257 deals closed in 2018 vs 202 deals in 2017.

Hampleton Partners also noted that nearly one third of insurtech investments targeted European companies, with Europe’s global investment share growing from 23 per cent to 31 per cent.

This trend is spearheaded by insurtech hubs in Germany, the UK and France – with half of the ten largest insurtech investments in 2018 flowing into companies based in Berlin.

High Net Worth private investors are increasing their exposure to alternative assets to achieve greater portfolio diversification in an uncertain economic climate, reveals research from Connection Capital, the specialist private client investment business.

Albemarle Street Partners (ASP), the specialist discretionary investment manager and investment consultancy for professional advisers, has announced the appointment of Chris Holdoway as Investment Director and Eleanor Williams as Partnerships Director, with effect from October 2019. 

PrimaryBid, the award-winning FCA-regulated online platform connecting publicly listed companies with everyday investors for discounted share issuances, has closed a £7 million funding round, led by Pentech and Outward VC with participation from new and existing investors.  The investment enables the company to aggressively expand its sales and marketing efforts as well as accelerate IT product development.