Eleven fast growing businesses have secured £2m of funding from HBAN (Halo Business Angel Network) Ulster Business Angels during its first year of operation in Northern Ireland.

proSapient, the Expert Network and Primary Research Platform, has raised new equity capital to support its rapid growth. The round was led by 24Haymarket and existing investors.

BGF is to appoint Stephen Welton, founder CEO of BGF, to the new role of Executive Chairman. 

Glasgow based investment syndicate Kelvin Capital has seen a 19% increase in its total investments in 2019, compared to 2018 levels.  The record figure saw £12.5m being invested, up from £10.5m in 2018, with new syndicate members joining from Europe and the Far East.

In the last quarter of 2019 alone, £2.75m was invested in Scottish based businesses including £1m into hydrogen technology company Logan Energy.  In the first quarter of 2020, £3.3m of new investment has already been committed to portfolio companies.

Foresight Group is supporting the MBO of Signature Private Finance Holdings Limited from private equity firm, Cabot Square Capital, with an investment of £16.8 million to secure a majority stake in the Company.  Foresight will also provide an initial £5 million revolving credit facility for the specialist property lender.  Signature has also updated its brand, becoming Signature Property Finance, to better reflect its market offering.

Independent Growth Finance (IGF), a leading independent commercial finance provider, has entered the new decade in style with seven new clients signed in December and £126 million funds in use. Despite a turbulent year for SMEs across the UK, IGF’s funds in use have continued to grow at pace.

Private equity firm WestBridge has promoted Tim Whittard to partner. 

Placed, a mobile recruitment matchmaking platform for the service industry, has received investment from two members of Henley Business Angels, contributing towards a funding round of £1.2m.

Placed functions through having companies sign up to their platform and display jobs, solving the recruitment problem so many of them face by matching them up with prospective candidates seeking jobs. The idea for Placed came from years of working in the hospitality industry and by addressing each company’s needs Placed has grown rapidly; over 2,000 brands have now signed up to Placed, from Park Plaza Hotels to ROKA Restaurants, Nando’s and many more together with a growing database of over 100,000 job seekers.

24Haymarket leads £1.1m investment in MWS Technology, a leader in the apprenticeship technology space, has raised new equity capital to support its rapid growth.

HBAN recruited more than 100 business angel investors last year – significantly higher than its projected 75 new angels. The organisation is now aiming to sign up a further 100 angels in 2020, with its recruitment drive kicking off next month at HBAN’s All-Island Conference.

Business angel investment is continuing to grow across the island of Ireland and in December last year, HBAN announced that its members have now invested more than €100M in start-ups since 2007. This represents a doubling of the €50M figure reached in 2015 thanks to increasing angel numbers and activity.

Seneca Partners have appointmented Siobhan Pycroft as Investment Executive in their expanding Growth Capital Team as they target new investment of £15 million during 2020. Seneca is seeking to support well-managed businesses with strong leadership that can demonstrate established, proven concepts and are seeking an injection of growth capital and expertise to support their continued development.

Edinburgh-based bioinformatics company, Fios Genomics, which helps pharmaceutical and biotech companies to analyse the large amounts of data generated during drug development, has announced a strategic partnership with one of the world’s largest contract research organisations, Charles River Laboratories.