As the impact of the Coronavirus outbreak begins to directly impact more businesses, NatWest has outlined the initial support it will provide to SMEs across the UK, including a £5bn Working Capital Support.

Instanda, the leading customer and policy management platform for the insurance industry, has completed a $19.5m Series A fundraising round, the company has announced today. Led by Assembly Capital Partners the investment will support the firm’s international expansion in the United States, Europe, Asia and Latin America following several years of triple digit growth.

Intertrust has appointed Frank Hattann as Global Head of Sales. 

The majority of advisers have a very positive view of the importance of ESG in portfolio construction, according to a new study[1] among financial advisers by Foresight Group.

The research, conducted among more than 100 financial advisers, revealed that: almost two-thirds of advisers (64%) see ESG considerations as ‘important’ when building portfolios for their clients, of which 15% see it as ‘very important’.

Insurance platform Collective Benefits has closed a £3.3 million seed round led by U.K.-based Stride.VC, alongside existing investors Delin Ventures, Insurtech Gateway and several angels from executives at Uber, Deliveroo and Urban.

Aventus, the London-based B2B insurtech business and insurance operating system originally created for the MGA Homelyfe, has closed a £2.6m investment led by Outward VC and Notion Capital with participation from TriplePoint and Downing Ventures. The £2.6m investment will be used to scale up the business.

Aventus's modular Insurance Operating System, allows insurers to create policies and automatically quote and bind in under a minute, asking minimal questions. 

Triple Point Investment Management has announced a £10m facility into WeFlex, a leading provider of vehicles to the Ride-Hailing market in the UK. Having worked with the team at Weflex for the past 5 years, Triple Point will back their growth and development in the UK. The funds will be used by WeFlex to further increase its operations across the country, expand its fleet of electric vehicles, as well as other hybrids to further support the green initiatives in the UK ride-hailing market.

Funds advised by YFM Equity Partners have backed a £5.6m investment into Unbiased EC1 Limited to support the continued growth of the team and its financial advice marketplace. YFM’s investment comes from its two advised VCTs, British Smaller Companies VCT plc and British Smaller Companies VCT2 plc, alongside YFM Equity Partners Growth II LP.

Unbiased is the leading online platform for connecting millions of people to the trusted financial specialists across Financial Adviser, Mortgage Broker and Accountancy markets.

The membership of the Association of Investment Companies (AIC) has elected Gay Collins and Francesca Ecsery to the board of the AIC.

GP Bullhound, a leading technology advisory and investment firm, has acted as financial exclusive advisor to EcoVadis on a USD200M growth investment from CVC Growth Partners – the  largest transaction in the ESG space, and the largest equity fundraising in France in Enterprise Software to date.

British Business Investments (BBI), a commercial subsidiary of the British Business Bank, has announced a £25 million commitment to asset finance specialist, Blackburn-based Haydock Finance Ltd.  The three-year funding commitment is structured as a block discounting facility and will help Haydock continue to grow its asset finance division, providing hire-purchase, leasing and refinance for business assets to smaller businesses wanting to invest and grow.

NatWest is partnering with Moneypenny, the world’s largest and highest rated outsourced communications provider, to bring the 900 entrepreneurs it supports through its Accelerators exclusive access to tools and advice that will help them to grow and develop their businesses.